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COFKRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



FOOTBALL 
WITHOUT 
A COACH 



By 

WALTER GAMP 

Football Without a Coach 

Walter Camp's Handbook on 
Health 

Danny the Freshman 

Captain Danny 

Danny Fists 

Old Ryerson 

Jack Hall at Yale 

The Substitute 

These Are Appleton Books 

D. APPLETON & COMPANY 

Publishers New York 



T 171 C 



FOOTBALL 

WITHOUT A COACH 

BY 

WALTER CAMP 

SECRETARY FOOTBALL RuLeS COMMITTEE, 

AUTHOR OF "the SUBSTITUTE," 

"captain DANNY,'* ETC. 




ILLUSTRATED 



D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 
NEW YORK LONDON 

1920 






COPYRIGHT, 1920, BY 

D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 



©CI.A576027 



JvJL j! ij;:^U 



Copyright, 1920, by Otis F. Wood, Inc. 

PRINTED IH THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 



^ 



PREFACE 

They have organized a football team In 
the factory near the railroad. They get 
along for the first ten days, and then they 
strike a snag. They don't know how to 
carry on. "What ought a team to do during 
the second week of the season?" the captain 
asked hopelessly. 

*Tootball Without a Coach" answers the 
question. Walter Camp, from his large ex- 
perience, has formed an average football 
team in his mind. He outlines what that 
team should do the first week, how it should 
[progress the second week, along what chan- 
nels its practice should run the third week. 
He warns it of dangers that will crop up 
here and there ; he tells it how to surmount 
the difficulties that arise with more or less 
regularity. He becomes, to all intents and 
purposes, the pen-and-ink coach of that team, 

V 



PREFACE 

anticipating its troubles and applying the 
remedy. 

Nothing like this has ever before been 
done in football, Jt is a text book for the 
grammar school boy, the high school stu- 
dent, the young man playing on his shop, fac- 
tory or office team, and the college man 
anxious to make the 'Varsity. Behind it lies 
over thirty years of football experience. It 
is the chart and the compass of every foot- 
ball team that must worry along without 
having a professional coach right on the field 
to tell it what to do and what not to do. 



VI 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER I 
BUILDING THE FOUNDATION 

PAGE 

Importance of Diet and Cleanliness — First Days 
OF Practice — Go Easy at the Start — Getting 
Started Right as a Kicker — Punctuality at 
Practice . 1 

CHAPTER n 

SIZING UP THE CANDIDATES 

What to do Should you be Hurt — Advancing 
THE Kickers — ^What Each Position Demands 
— Correct Form in Catching the Ball — Cap- 
tains Good and Bad . . . . , . y ', 23 

CHAPTER III 
THE FIRST SCRIMMAGE 

Signals — Signal Drills — Why Players Should 
Walk Through Plays at the Start — Giving 
the ICickers a Target — Interference ... 43 
vii 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER IV 

PRACTICE WITHOUT A SCRUB 

PAGE 

Skill of More Value than Weight— Playing 
One-half a Team Against Another Half — 
Eyes on the Ball — Place Kicks— Weather 
Affects the Ball— Blocking 62 

CHAPTER V 

THE LINE AND THE FORWARD PASS 

Three Ways of Throwing the Pass— Receiving 
THE Pass — Planning the Plays— Work of 
THE End — Harmony in a Team .... y. 83 

CHAPTER VI 
THE LINE 

What Constitutes a Good Line— How to Instruct 
Players Individually — How to Open Holes 
FOR THE Man with the Ball — Holding Hard 
r— The Line Defensively 100 

CHAPTER VII 
THE BACKFIELD 

Qualities that Every Backfield Man must Have 
— Interfering for the Man with the Ball — 
Backing up the Line When it is Hard 
Pressed— Breaking up the Forward Pass . 122 
yiii 



f CONTENTS 

CHAPTER yill 
BUILDING PLAYS 

PAGE 

How TO Diagnose Staleness— Trying to Find the 
Cause— Right and Wrong Way to Handle 
A Stale Team— What to do as the Team 
Comes Back to Normal 138 

CHAPTER IX 
THE STRATEGY OF FOOTBALL 

Action that is Dictated When the Ball is in 
Midfield — Forty Yards from the Goal Line 
— Tense Moments Within the Twenty Yard 
Line 154 

CHAPTER X 
THINGS THAT MAKE OR BREAK A TEAM 

Handling a Team so that it Reaches its Big 
Game in its Best Shape — Keeping the Players 
Light-hearted — Before the Team Goes Out 
TO Face its Test — What Happens Between 
THE Halves — Taking Victory or Defeat Like 
Men . .. . . . . . . , 166 



!x 



FOOTBALL 
WITHOUT A COACH 

CHAPTER I 

BUILDING THE FOUNDATION 

It is only natural that boys and young 
men who love a hard, clean game of physical 
prowess should select football. The beauty 
of the sport Is that there seems to be a place 
on a football team for a player of any 
physique, provided, of course, that he is in 
normal health. The fat boy, who has been 
the joke of his comrades, suddenly finds that 
he is excellent material for a football center, 
provided — another of course — that he works 
hard and masters the position. The active 
little fellow, who has not been able to hold 
his own with the bigger boys in wrestling and 
other rough sports, finds himself a quarter- 
back through his ability to use his hands and 

I 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

his head. The big slow boy gets a place as 
guard, and the fast quick tackier goes out 
on the end. And the boy who can kick and 
forward pass finds a place for himself be- 
hind the line. There is room for all. 

Perhaps there was nothing to which the 
war and its results gave a greater impetus 
than football. It was played by thousands 
of men in camps, cantonments and stations 
in this country, and by the A. E. F. and fleet 
teams abroad. It was found that this game 
of mimic warfare developed the stalwart, 
courageous fighter — and we all know what 
the stalwart, courageous American soldier 
and sailor did. 

Before the war football was the sport of 
the schools, the colleges and the playgrounds. 
Now it has found its way into the hearts of 
the upstanding men of the nation. It has 
been adopted by the working boy, and shops 
and factories have their teams. The new 
rules have made the game less strenuous in 
some respects, and have made it more inter- 
esting in others. An enormous demand has 
arisen for instruction and coaching. 

2 



BUILDING THE FOUNDATION 

So great is this demand that It Is utterly 
impossible fully to supply It. Expert foot- 
ball coaches are needed not only In the col- 
leges but In the schools, In the playgrounds, 
and now more than ever In the communities 
where there are Industrial plants. This 
Season will see thousands of men who have 
come out of service turning to the sport they 
played while In uniform. It will also see the 
development of factory teams, shop teams, 
inter-department teams and thousands of 
school teams. Indeed, the gridiron will this 
fall be the center of sport. In view of the 
great shortage of coaches of ability, some- 
thing must be done to enable boys to advance 
in the game more rapidly than they could 
with Inferior instruction or with no instruc- 
tion at all Without the knowledge of how 
to go at the game they will not get the best 
results. 

This method of coaching Is intended to ex- 
plain in detail the various points that a per- 
son should know In preparing himself to play 
football. It is a comparatively simple thing 
to make a good player out of a boy of aver- 

3 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

age speed, strength and agility, and the posi- 
tions are such that all boys and young men 
have an opportunity. But if a person is to 
become a good player, much time must be 
spent in practicing the details and in learn- 
ing the steps from the very beginning. That 
is why you will often hear college men speak 
of the advisability of starting the 'Varsity 
team in the fall on fundamentals — ^that is, in 
teaching them the simplest parts of football 
and in keeping them at this work for a good, 
long time. 

Now, let us suppose that you want to make 
a football player out of yourself. Let us 
suppose that I am your coach. I say to you : 

First — Cut out smoking. 

Second — Eat what you like of good food, 
but have very little to do with pastries. Pies 
are not good for the person who wants to 
become an athlete. Get at least eight hours 
sleep a night— get nine hours if you can. 
Don't drink a lot with your meals, but drink 
in the morning before breakfast, and in the 
evening, and after you have cooled off from 
your exercise. Drink at least eight or nine 

4 



BUILDING THE FOUNDATION 

glasses of water a day. Do not do your 
football playing directly after eating. Wait 
two or three hours, if possible. If not, eat 
lightly before playing. I know a big, husky, 
190-pound college player who developed 
what he thought was heart trouble. He gave 
up football, but soon discovered that his heart 
was all right. Playing the game a half- 
hour after eating was what had sickened 
him. 

You must do all these things because foot- 
ball is no joke. If a man means to play the 
game in earnest, he should get himself in the 
best of shape. Then it will be easy for him 
to master the player who has not taken care 
of himself, for condition tells enormously in 
this sport. You must remember, too, that 
whatever you do for the benefit of your con- 
dition now, counts later in whatever athletic 
work you enter. 

Another thing that is excellent for the 
football player is exercise that will make the 
body strong and supple, for the body itself 
is one of the chief assets of the player. 
When it is supple and powerful he can move 

S 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

in any direction and get a good charge or pro- 
vide good interference; if he is stiff in the 
muscles of the trunk he is likely to become 
lame and is infinitely less efficient in his work. 
This is particularly true of linemen. A line- 
man who can charge only in a straight line 
will always be beaten by a lineman who can 
sway his body and strike from the sides, or 
who can put forth a muscular effort with the 
trunk while his feet may be in an awkward 
position. Here are three exercises which 
are particularly good for football men which 
take only a few minutes and should be prac- 
ticed every day : 




Fig. 1 

First Exercise: (A) Raise arms to hori- 
zontal. Move the left foot twelve inches 

6 



BUILDING THE FOUNDATION 

from the right. Slowly bend the fists and 
lower the arms downward from the elbows. 
Then curl the fists upward into the armpits 
bending the head backward meanwhile until 
you look upward at the ceiling. Take a deep 
breath as you bend the head back. See cut, 
Fig. I. 

(B) Then, without resting, extend the 
arms straight forward from the shoulders, 
palms down; let the arms begin to fall and 




Fig. 2 

the body to bend forward from the waist,, 
head up, eyes to the front, until the body has 
reached the limit of motion, and the arms 
have passed the sides and been forced back 
and up as far as possible. The deep breath 
should be slowly exhaled as you bend for- 

7 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

ward. Do the whole exercise (A and B) five 
times. See Fig. 2. 

Second Exercise: Move the right foot 
until the heels are about 12 inches apart. 
Raise arms to horizontal. Bend the knees 
and, with the weight on the toes, lower the 
body almost to the heels, keeping the trunk 
as nearly erect as possible. Do this ten times. 
See Fig. 3. 




FtG,B 



Third Exercise: Raise arms as before, 
horizontal. Stretch the arms straight above 
the head, fingers interlocked, arms touching 
ears. Then with the fingers still interlocked 
describe a complete circle about 24 inches in 
diameter, the body bending only at the waist. 
Do this five times. Then repeat the move- 
ment five times, but in the opposite direction. 

8 



BUILDING THE FOUNDATION 

Go through the entire movement slowly, and 
steadily, bending the body in its rotation as 
far as possible from the hips. See Fig. 4. 

Cleanliness is another thing of prime im- 
portance. Too much bathing has a tendency 
to be weakening, but a daily sponge bath fol- 
lowed by a brisk rub with a rough towel will 
keep a person feeling like a fighting cock. 
Right here, too, let me warn boys against 




Fig. 4 

reducing weight. Boys read how this and 
that athlete had to take off weight, and they 
get the idea that taking off weight is the first 
requisite of success in any sport. Let the boy 
play the hardest when on the field, and keep 
his body clean, and get his eight or nine hours 

9 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

of sleep, and eat good food, and his weight 
will take care of itself. 

Another thing to be borne in mind in this 
connection is that one of the worst things 
for a nervous condition and one of the things 
that sometimes makes a player go stale is 
worry. If you are doing your best there is 
no need to worry. If you are not doing your 
best there is not much reason for you to con- 
tinue the game. If you are afraid of another 
player making your position you will simply 
have to work harder. It is not necessary to 
worry about it, but to be more determined, 
more persistent, more patient and more care- 
ful. If, when the actual time comes to select 
the team, he is a better man than you, then 
you certainly want him to have the place for 
the good of the team itself. But the candi- 
date who thinks the most and works the hard- 
est, other things being equal, will make the 
place. 

So far as the actual game of football is 
concerned, every player should know the 
rules. A rule book costs very little, and the 
player who knows the rules has a distinct 

lO 



BUILDING THE FOUNDATION 

advantage over the player who doesn't. I 
have seen a boy who knew the rules and had 
very little other advantage become quarter 
of a team and later captain simply because 
of his greater knowledge. 

Now for the early practice. If possible, 
try to have a ground that is well rolled and 
free from lumps and hummocks. The more 
level the ground, the less chance for unex- 
pected twists and tumbles. And these are 
productive of sprains and bruises. 

When a team or a portion of a team gets 
together, the first thing to be done is to 
practice handling the ball and falling on it 
when it is on the ground. Let the players 
gather around in a group and pass the ball 
from hand to hand. Let one man roll the 
ball into the group and call the name of the 
player who is to take it. The one so called 
should endeavor to clutch the ball in his arms 
as he falls to the ground. 

There is a great deal of knack about fall- 
ing on a ball. When a football is rolling on 
the ground it is apt to bound irregularly be- 
cause of its oval shape. Sometimes it is rest- 

II 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

ing still on the ground and at other times it 
is bobbing along. 

When a player is practicing falling on the 
ball he takes a step or two and shoots for- 
ward, sliding his body along the ground, as 
it were, and makes a pocket for the ball with 
his arms. He brings the ball up against his 
body, and at the same time bends his body 
around it. That is the detail of the whole 
act. 

If a player falls directly on the ball with 
his body, he bounds up on the ball and jars 
himself, and seldom wins possession of the 
ball for all his effort. If he slides straight 
over it with his hands extended, it is quite 
likely to elude his hands at the first touch. 
Then he is lost indeed, for he cannot reach 
the ball afterwards. 

He should so slide on the ground as to 
be able to put his arms and hands over the 
ball and draw it to himself, at the same time 
curving his body so that the ball is snuggled 
in. A little practice will enable a player to 
make this play quickly and to make it well. 
^ The importance of this act of falling on 

12 



BUILDING THE FOUNDATION 

the ball should not be minimized. Many a 
time in an important game there is a fumble, 
and the side which secures possession of the 
ball after that fumble may with that very act 
win or save the game. It is surprising how 
practice develops an ability to get down to 
the ground quickly on a rolling ball and also 
how familiarity breeds experience in grasp- 
ing it and holding on to it. It is good prac- 
tice once in a while to roll the ball away from 
the group and let all scramble for it. This 
should be done unexpectedly in order to see 
which is the quickest thinker on the team. A 
false motion by the man who is rolling the 
ball in is also a good thing to practice every 
now and then, so that the players do not 
know exactly the direction in which the ball 
is coming. It is also well occasionally to take 
the ball and bounce it on the ground so that 
it goes up and down instead of rolling along. 
In other words, practice all possible methods 
in order that skill may be acquired in secur- 
ing the ball under any and all conditions. 

The practice of the entire first day, and in 
fact for a day or two thereafter, should be 

13 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

falling on the ball and passing the ball from 
one to another. Falling on the ball is a good 
conditioning exercise. Aside from that it 
IS an important part of football. When the 
ball is on the ground, the player who first 
falls on it and secures it, secures possession 
of it for his side. That is of vital importance 
for the side that has possession makes the 
attack. The attacking side, by reason of its 
signals, knows just what plays are to be used; 
the defensive side, without this knowledge, 
must not only stop that attack but must stop 
it four times before the ball has been ad- 
vanced ten yards. Only then can the de- 
fensive side secure possession of the ball. I 
tell this so that every player will come to 
realize how important it is that he should 
be able to fall on the ball and hold it tight. 
It may be that one act wins the game. 

Now for a word about passing the ball 
from one to another. The ball assumes a 
natural position when properly held. If a 
player learns to hold the ball properly he 
will never be known as a fumbler, and "fum- 
bler" is the worst name that can be applied 

14 



BUILDING THE FOUNDATION 

to anybody on a good team. I have told you 
about the value of possession. Very often 
the fumbler is responsible for his side los- 
ing the ball, and that very mistake may cost 
his side a touchdown and perhaps the game 
itself. Hence, no time can be considered as 
wasted that is spent in learning to grasp the 
ball properly. 

As I have already said, the ball, because 
of its shape, takes a natural position in the 
player's arm. When properly held the ball 
should extend along his forearm into the joint 
of his elbow, should be braced by his arm 
and should be held by the hand to the side 
of his body. When, in addition to this, he 
clasps the other hand on the ball, there is 
no possibility of its getting away from him. 
Even quite a blow will not dislodge it. 

Many a team has lost a game through 
carelessness in handling the ball at a certain 
critical moment. In the Great-Lakes-An- 
napolis game, Annapolis had scored a 
touchdown but had failed to kick the goal. 
In the second half, nearly at the end 
of the game, Annapolis had carried the 

15 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

ball again down to the Great Lakes' goal 
line and was practically in the very act of 
carrying It over. The ball was passed to the 
fullback, and just as he was going through 
the Great Lakes team and across the goal 
line he fumbled the ball — and a Great Lakes 
player picked it up and ran the length of the 
field for a touchdown. The touchdown was 
converted into a goal, and Great Lakes 
walked off the winner. 

I have known experienced quarterbacks 
who, when they got their team up to the 15- 
yard line and In possession of the ball, would 
caution their backs before each play to 
'^Squeeze the ball," **Don't fumbV and 
*'Don't drop this ball" in order to insure the 
greatest care on the part of the backs. A 
man who is poorly taught handling the ball 
in the beginning is very apt to be a fumbler. 
Whatever he learns at first seems to stick 
to him, and although his fault may be cor- 
rected in time, in a moment of excitement 
out slips the ball from his arms and the fatal 
fumble has come. For this reason it is par- 
ticularly important that in the very earliest 

16 



BUILDING THE FOUNDATION 

practice of the game every player should 
learn to hold the ball, to squeeze it tight when 
he goes into the line, and to take no chance 
of dropping it. 

When practicing handling the ball, a 
player should take the ball in his hands, 
quickly slip it into the position I have de- 
scribed, release it and pass it to the next 
player. This next man repeats the perfor- 
mance, and so it goes through the squad. 

I have seen a first-class team, in the last 
week of practice, spend five minutes a day 
doing this one thing. Handling the ball 
forms a large part of the first week's work 
done by all 'Varsity teams. 

Right here I want to say a word of cau- 
tion. Go at the early practice easily. Often 
the player's heart is set on making the team, 
and he has an idea that the moment practice 
starts he is on trial and must do mighty 
stunts to attract attention. Let the mighty 
stunts wait a while until muscles are hard- 
ened. Many of the minor injuries of foot- 
ball come in the first days of practice because 
of eager recklessness. 

n 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

Slow and sure is the rule. Not that that 
means any lack of spirit and dash — ^but it 
means care. It means practicing the details, 
such as falling on the ball and passing, all 
with infinite pains. Moreover, captains of 
teams should be very careful not to play their 
men to a point of exhaustion in the early sea- 
son. Practice fast and hard, not necessarily 
scrimmaging, but do not practice to a point 
where, through weariness, the work becomes 
slow. To do this means to pick up habits of 
slowness. 

There should be some kicking the first 
week, and some forward passing, too. As 
for kicking, this practice should be short in 
hours, but it should extend steadily week after 
week through the entire season. If you have 
men for the backfield positions, or for any 
of the positions, who have had a year or 
two of kicking experience, let them start to 
gently boot the oval — and mind, I said 
gently. But if you must develop a kicker 
from raw material, above all this do not 
start by having this kicking candidate try 
actual kicking. This may sound strange, but 

i8 



BUILDING THE FOUNDATION 

you'll know the reason for it in a moment. 

As to the reason of my order to start 
gently, many a good man has lamed himself 
by punting too hard and too long in the early 
part of the season. A punter's leg is like 
a pitcher's arm, and should be worked in 
gradually, not only at the start of the season 
but also at the beginning of play each day. 
A strain acquired in the early part of the 
practice may put a good kicker out of busi- 
ness or shorten the possibilities of his kicking 
for the whole season. As soon as the kicker 
reaches a point where he can swing the leg 
freely HE MUST LEARN TO KICK 
QUICKLY. But I'll tell you more about 
kicking later. 

Now as to why the kicking candidate 
should not at first try actual kicking. The 
first step is to give him the ball, let him put 
it on the ground and just kick it about the 
field. He should do this twicQ a day for 
half an hour at a time! before he tries a punt. 
This practice lets him find out where his 
foot Is. It takes away any chance of letting 
him hurt himself by kicking at the ball and 

19 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

missing it. Lots of players fail as kickers 
because they try to punt right at the outset 
without having any preliminary practice in 
finding their foot and the ball. Those who 
try to punt right at the start are necessarily 
awkward, and this awkwardness leads to 
hopeless bad form. Such a player some- 
times, by dogged persistence, may actually 
reach a point where he can kick thirty-five 
yards or so. But he is always erratic in per- 
formance, unsteady in his aim, and in a game 
is always a scource of anxiety to a team. So 
much for kicking the first week. 

There is another matter of importance. 
Have a certain hour for practice and see to 
it that all the players report promptly. It is 
bad for candidates to slouch into the practice 
at any hour they see fit. It is bad for the 
discipline of the team. When those who re- 
port on time have to sit around and wait for 
late comers, they speedily lose interest in the 
practice. It often happens that from tardi- 
ness alone what promised to He a good team 
gradually drifts apart. Fortunately the mili- 
tary discipline that has gone through the 

20 



BUILDING THE FOUNDATION 

whole community in the past two or three 
years has been an excellent thing in this 
respect. Imagine what it would be if troops 
were commanded to fall in and the officer 
found one man still lacking his shoes, another 
strolling leisurely from his breakfast, and 
others engaged in various occupations which 
did not lend themselves to speedy action. 
Yet this is what happens in the case of many 
teams. If you can get a part of military pre- 
cision and promptness into your football 
team you shall have gained a great deal. 

Don't be satisfied with a hazy knowledge 
of the rules. Master every detail. 

Don't let any player be ahead of you in 
dropping on the ball when there is a fumble. 

Don't do anything to hurt the discipline of 
your team. When you injure discipline you 
injure your entire game. 

Don't be discouraged with what progress 
you make. The right spirit is everything. 

Don't despise the small details. 

Don't shirk either studies or work for foot- 
ball. Earn the right to play the game. 

Don't be an automatic player. Master 

21 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

every principle. Know the reason for what 
you do. 

Don't be late for practice. If you are not 
interested enough to be prompt resign from 
the team at once. 



CHAPTER II 

SIZING UP THE CANDIDATES 

Football is a game of skill and strength. 
It is a give-and-take game, with now and then 
some hard knocks. For that reason, before 
beginning to play the game in earnest, a 
player should have himself in fair condition. 
He should have done some running for his 
wind, and he should have taken some gen- 
eral exercise. He should have taken the 
muscle stretching exercise for suppliiig and 
hardening himself. He should not be soft 
from sitting around and doing nothing. It 
Is the worst kind of folly for a person who 
has had no good exercise to take up football 
suddenly. 

For such a boy plays to find himself sooner 
or later — generally sooner — with some 

23 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

minor injury. A college team has the bene- 
fit of trainers and rubbers, and usually there 
is a skilled surgeon to look after injuries. 
But the boy who plays with a small school 
team, or the man who plays with a club team 
or factory team, has none of these advan- 
tages. Therefore, it is important that he 
should understand at the outset certain of the 
things that it is essential he should know if 
he is going to take proper care of himself 
during training. And it is also important 
that he should know how to take care of 
minor injuries should they come. 

As I told you in the first chapter, a player 
should not smoke. Neither, I might add, 
should he take alcohol. While pastries are 
bad for him, yet, as a dessert he may have 
a little ice cream and occasionally a simple 
sweet pudding. As a matter of fact, any 
player who watches himself closely can pretty 
well tell for himself what does and does not 
agree with him. 

Now let us consider the prevention of in- 
juries. The shoes a player wears should be 
high ones so as to protect the ankles. It is a 

24 



SIZING UP THE CANDIDATES 

good plan to bandage the ankles lightly every 
day with a cloth bandage, and a person can 
learn to do this himself. While this method 
of bandaging is not absolutely necessary, it 
sometimes prevents a sprained ankle if one is 
playing on rough ground. Bandaging, how- 
ever, should not be overdone, as too much 
protection along this line does not allow the 
ankle to strengthen itself by exercise and mo- 
tion. On the other hand, any player who has 
a tendency to weak ankles should wear a 
bandage that is not too tight but simply sup- 
porting. The rising on the toes in the spe- 
cial exercise I described in the first chapter 
will do much toward strengthening the arch 
of the foot and ankle. 

Padding in the trousers, and on the elbows 
and shoulders of the jersey, can be used to 
good advantage as pads save their wearer 
many bruises. Light, cheap fibre shin guards 
for players in the middle of the line, to be 
worn either under or over the stockings, will 
save barked shins. Neither of these safe- 
guards, of course, are absolutely essential, 
and a great many players do without them. 

25 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

A good head-guard, especially for those 
playing in the backfield, is worth having and 
should be worn. Should a player get a blow 
on the nose, and should the nose become sen- 
sitive, a nose-guard can Be worn for a few 
days. Nose-guards, though, should never be 
worn unless needed, as they interfere with 
breathing. A quarterback, due to the fact 
that he must give the signals, cannot make 
use of an article of this kind. 

Probably the most important point of all 
is to have shoes that fit and do not hurt the 
feet. The worst thing that can happen to 
a football player is getting blisters and abra- 
sions that later on will give him trouble. An 
ordinary shoe, with cross pieces put on by the 
shoemaker, is preferable to a new football 
shoe that does not fit, or that rubs the heels 
or produces any soreness. It is best to break 
in a new shoe by wearing it only a day at a 
time. 

Should a blister form on the foot, it should 
be taken care of, if possible, before it breaks. 
If, however, the skin is broken, a com plaster 
put over the blister and strapped with sur- 

26 



SIZING UP THE CANDIDATES 

geon's plaster so that it will not slip will 
enable the player to go on without discom- 
fort. As to how to take care of an unbroken 
blister I know of no better advice than that 
contained in the Plattsburg Manual: 

"Be careful not to tear off the skin cover- 
ing the blister. Heat the point of a needle 
until it is red hot and when it cools insert it 
under the live skin a little distance from the 
blister. Push it through to the under side 
of the bruised skin or blister and press out 
the water. To protect the blister grease a 
small piece of chamois with vaseline and 
place it so that it covers the blister and ex- 
tends over the solid skin surrounding it. 
Then place a piece of oxide adhesive tape 
over the chamois. This method allows the 
protective covering to be removed without 
rupturing the skin over the blister, and pro- 
tects the new, tender and sensitive skin so 
that the weight can be rested upon the foot 
without causing severe pain.'* 

Probably the most common of the simplest 
injuries is a sprained ankle. This should be 
treated at once by hot applications. If it is 

27 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

seized In time a sprain is neither a long nor 
a serious affair. By bathing the ankle stead- 
ily in water not hot enough to injure the 
skin, and then bandaging and putting on some 
simple remedy like Pond's Extract, a player 
will get well rapidly. Many a man has 
been able to play within a few days under 
this treatment. The bandage should be 
worn as soon as the person starts to play 
again, and should continue to be worn, in 
fact, until the ankle gets back its strength. 

A bruised thumb or finger joint can be 
treated in the same fashion. Wherever it is 
possible to have a surgeon's care, of course 
that is the best plan. But for sprained ankles 
or anything of the kind simple remedies are 
usually effective. Muscle bruises can be 
treated with hot water and arnica or any 
other simple home remedy. 

Let me sound one note of warning, how- 
ever. There is a point where home treat- 
ment of injuries should cease, and that point 
comes when the knee is injured. An injured 
knee should be taken to a doctor at once, 
especially if there is any swelling or effusion. 

28 



SIZING UP THE CANDIDATES 

An injury to the knee, especially in the way 
of a twist, which may or may not displace 
the semilunar cartilage, is apt to be extremely 
serious for a football man because the liga- 
ments around the joints are stretched and 
do not recover their normal elasticity. Im- 
mediate attention is important, and this, too, 
of the best surgical kind. Fortunately, knee 
Injuries seem to come but seldom to younger 
boys because probably their weight is not so 
great in proportion to their strength. Older 
football players are more prone to this in- 
jury. Luckily it is not common but it is ex- 
tremely incapacitating, and should be treated 
at once. 

Now let us return to the actual prepara- 
tory play. 

In the first chapter I told you of the im- 
portance of passing and of handling the ball. 
It is well, the first two weeks, to close out 
each day's work with a run around the field 
to benefit the wind. 

If you have followed the instructions of 
my first chapter your kicker, if he is learning 
to kick the oval, will have reached a point 

29 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

where he knows where his foot is and where 
the ball is. The ball is no longer a stranger 
to his foot. They begin to understand each 
other. So now he can begin to kick. 

I told you that the kicker must learn to do 
his business quickly. Many a long-distance 
punter has been useless to his team because 
of his inability to get his kicks off quickly. 
Of course, it is possible to take a back so 
far behind the line that there is little possi- 
bility of blocking his kicks, but that involves 
a great deal harder work from the center 
rush or snapper back in getting the ball back 
to him, and if by chance a wet day comes 
for the game it is impossible to get the ball 
back this distance. It takes an exceptionally 
good center to get the ball back with speed 
on a long, low pass, and if the ball is slippery 
and heavy with wet the feat is impossible. 
Therefore, if a man has not learned to kick 
quickly in the early part of his work and has 
relied upon extra distance back of the line, 
he never can do the punting on a wet day, 
for the ball will come to him on the ground, 
wet and slippery, and the result will be a 

30 



SIZING UP THE CANDIDATES 

fumble, or a blocked kick and disaster. This 
is the great and important reason for break- 
ing in kickers early to have rapid action, and 
by this is not meant snapping the ball off, 
but precision and agility. Some men take 
three steps for a punt and when they are 
hurried at all are absolutely hopeless. A 
man must also get the ball properly into his 
hands at the same time that he is taking 
the one step that is necessary. Every bit of 
skill in this respect counts in the way of sav- 
ing a fraction of a second, and a fraction of 
a second often means the difference between 
getting the ball off safely and having it 
blocked. Every experienced man knows that 
in a game the opposing line breaks through 
faster than teams do in practice. The extra 
desire and determination to block the kick 
produces greater results. As a consequence 
a kicker is usually more hurried facing op- 
ponents in a real game than he ever is in 
practice. 

The kicker should never be permitted to 
boot the ball aimlessly. He should always 
kick with the determination to make the ball 

31 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

go to some special place. In other words, 
he should always have a target. 

Two rules must be observed by the person 
who has set out to kick. First, when he punts 
at his mark, he should hit the ball squarely 
with his instep upon the point of the ball. 
Second, he should not kick hard. 

For a starter let him stand out about fifteen 
yards from the goal posts. He may try 
dropping the ball with both hands and with 
one (hand in order that later he can adopt 
either style. He should try to kick the ball 
over the bar from this distance. This sim- 
ple, easy practice must be persisted in until 
the player can meet the point of the ball 
with his instep every time he kicks. 

Then he can begin a new exercise — kick- 
ing on the run. The run should be short, 
and the ball should be tossed a little to the 
side and not directly in front. At first, as 
he kicks, he will almost stop or else hit the 
ball inaccurately. But soon will come an im- 
provement. His next struggle will be to 
overcome the tendency to drop the ball out 
too far or In too near. That, too, will grad- 

32 



SIZING UP THE CANDIDATES 

ually be mastered. But all the while he 
should be kicking easily, and always kicking 
at a target. The desire to drop back, say, 
to the thirty-yard line and let drive at the 
goal posts should be strangled. So much 
for kicking during the second week. 
Now let us consider the positions : 
The ends should be lively, dashing play- 
ers, wiry and strong, and full of energy and 
ambition. An end must have eyes and must 
know how to use them, for at the ends of the 
line players can notice unusual formations be- 
fore they can be detected by the rest of the 
team. He should be an expert at dropping on 
the ball, for whenever the opposing quarter 
makes a pass that is too high or too far in 
advance of the runner, the end has a fine 
chance to get the ball. He must be cool, so 
that he can hope to cope with the strong in- 
terference that usually swings out with an 
end run. He must be fast so that he can go 
down the field under a kick and so that he 
can take a forward pass. And because he 
must go down the field under kicks he should 
be a sure and deadly tacklen In short, the 

33 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

end IS one of the most important players on 
the team because he must be a little of every- 
thing, and every inch of that little must be 
good. And his coolness must be of the kind 
that cannot be destroyed. An end who gets 
rattled when a swarm of interferers storm 
at him is useless to his team. 

As a matter of fact, there is no position so 
important from a defensive standpoint as 
that of the end. He simply must be able to 
break interference. He must not be drawn 
in. He must watch the sideline. He must 
never be fooled by trick plays, and in going 
down the field under a kick he must use skill 
and brains in knowing at what point to slow 
up so as to make sure of getting his man. 
Probably experience counts more in this posi- 
tion than in any other on the field. For while 
his duties are not as onerous as those of the 
quarterback, so far as defense is concerned 
they are far more important. He should 
work well with his tackle, understand his 
mate thoroughly, and also know when the 
man in the backfield is coming up to his sup- 
port. End, tackle and defensive back form a 

34 



SIZING UP THE CANDIDATES 

real triangle of cooperation, and these three 
players should understand this and make the 
most of it. 

The tackle must have only a fraction less 
dash than the end, but he must have more 
weight and more muscle. Alongside him is 
the light, wiry end, and in his rear is the 
quick, active backfield. He tries to save them 
as much as possible, and for that reason he 
must have the strength and the go to throw 
himself at the interference and to charge 
at the instant the ball is snapped. He 
does not work with the agile craftiness of 
the end. He throws himself headlong at 
plays; and if he doesn't get the runner, he 
at least smashes open a hole through which 
the end or a backfield player can follow and 
get the man who carries the ball. On offense 
he must be a good, rugged blocker so that 
he can hold back the enemy while his quarter 
IS getting the ball away. 

The guard must be powerful in his legs, 
his body and in his arms. If he has quick- 
ness so much the better, but he must have 
weight. Weight is imperative. He must be 

35 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

the sort of player who can settle low under 
a charge and refuse to be budged. For when 
the enemy has the ball, plays that hit him 
pile in hard and straight and fast, and gen- 
erally in a mass. He must be able to settle 
down — right down to the ground If neces- 
sary — and bring the charge to a stop. When 
his side has the ball, he must be able to hold 
off any player who tries to come through. If 
it is important for the tackle to protect the 
quarter, it is doubly important for the guard. 
For the quarter is right behind him. Pro- 
tecting the quarter is the first duty of the 
guard when his side has the ball. It Is in 
this play that his ability to bend low and 
stop a charge stands out the strongest. Here 
again we see the necessity for well developed 
trunk muscles. 

A team may use a lighter center with two 
heavy guards or one of his guards may be 
light if his center is heavy. 

The center should be heavier than the 
guard. But it is a mistake to think that any- 
one who Is fat will do, and that bulk alone 
is enough for the position. A center must 

36 



SIZING UP THE CANDIDATES 

be powerful in. his legs. He must have a 
good, steady poise. When he is set, he must 
be like a rock. He does not need the guard's 
activity, but he must have steadiness. With- 
out steadiness he cannot pass the ball to the 
quarter with exactly the same motion time 
after time, and a uniformity of movement is 
necessary to prevent fumbles by the quarter- 
back. 

We now come to the "nerves'* of the team 
— the quarterback. He is the general 
through whom must come almost every play. 
He is the vital spot in the team. There are 
teams that have been good despite a weak 
place in the line or in the backfield, but no 
team ever amounted to a row of pins that 
did not have a corking good quarter. 

He must have coolness, judgment and 
brains; and he must be the type of player 
who never gives up, who never lets a tone 
of discouragement sound in his voice. As a 
rule he should be small. There are very few 
good quarters who have been large. This is 
important for two reasons: First, a quarter 
has to bend over all through the game, and 

37 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

this would be cruelly hard on a big, heavy 
player; second, a big man or boy cannot as 
a rule get off fast enough to lead interference 
without materially slowing up the runner. 

The quarter must have a cheerful, confi- 
dent, alert disposition. He must jolly his 
team. He must keep it fighting. He must 
be the gunpowder of the team, the spark, the 
explosion. And he must be an expert at pass- 
ing the ball. His backs must have absolute 
confidence in him. They must start off at 
full speed with the signal, knowing that the 
quarter will have the ball for them at the 
exact moment that they should get it. His 
brain must be going all the time as he tries 
to discover new weaknesses in the enemy's 
defensive play, and he should always be ready 
for an opening. He should be a living, 
breathing, thinking streak of lightning. 

The backs^ — the fullback and the two half- 
backs — ^need not be necessarily large men, 
but they should be fast, well put together, 
and it is best that they have long legs, for 
legs help them to get through the opposing 
line. Another advantage is that the long- 

38 



SIZING UP THE CANDIDATES 

legged back can usually punt farther than 
the man whose legs are shorter. 

The principal thing that the backs must 
have is an absolute confidence in each other. 
They must be the three musketeers of the 
team. When one of them is given the ball, 
he must have the absolute conviction that the 
other backs will go in ahead of him and fight 
like demons to make his opening. Two of 
the backs should be able to kick and none of 
them should be clumsy. A clumsy back who 
sprawls all over himself slows up the plays, 
and is either injured himself or is responsible 
for the injuries of his comrades. 

I have told you that two of the backs 
should be able to kick, and I have also told 
you how to start the kicking. Naturally, 
that brings us to another part of the game, 
catching the ball. 

All the backs — and that includes the 
quarterback — should get a long, daily prac- 
tice in catching the ball. Most men and boys 
who are beginning the game make the mis- 
take of trying to catch a football almost as 
though it were a baseball. True, they do 

39 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

not actually try to make the catch with their 
hands, but they race nway madly almost as 
soon as the ball is kicked and act as though 
they were afraid it would sail off over the 
fence. 

A football travels more slowly than a base- 
ball and does not travel so far. The boy who 
is to make the catch should come in easily to 
the place where the oval is to fall. He 
should not tear in wildly and then wait ner- 
vously and anxiously for the leather to come 
down. By going in easily, he saves himself 
a wait for the ball. It comes to him gently 
and nicely, and he takes it apparently with- 
out concern. 

The oval should be caught In a sort of 
pocket formed by the arms held out from 
the chest. The ball should not be allowed to 
strike the chest, for then it would bound away. 
Practice so that the oval settles between the 
body and the arms. As it falls into this cav- 
ity it is hugged an instant to make sure of it; 
and to prevent it going all the way through 
and falling out on the ground, the right leg 
should be brought up gently as the catch is 

40 



SIZING UP THE CANDIDATES 

made. Then tKe ball is completely pock- 
eted with the arms and the body surrounding 
it, and with the leg preventing it from fall- 
ing through. 

Let me say one important word to you. 
Exercise care in your choice of a captain. 
Too often this office falls to the lot of a 
player who has popularity and nothing else. 
Popularity will avail nothing once the season 
starts, for the popular person may be lazy 
and easy-going and lackadaisical, and that 
means calamity to a team. 

A captain should be selected for his force 
of character. He need not be a brilliant 
player, but he should be a man in whose good 
qualities the others have faith. He must be 
known to be absolutely fair. He should be 
the sort of person who gets things done, who 
can give orders and have them obeyed. He 
should throw himself heart and soul into the 
practice, and by his sturdy worth be able to 
get the last ounce of good out of the players. 
He should be the one to whom the team looks 
in the crisis. If you have a crowd of your 
own, and if, whenever a question arises, the 
41 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

cry is '^Ask Tom'' or *'Ask Dick" or "Ask 
Harry," then Tom, Dick or Harry is prob- 
ably the one to captain your team. 

Don't talk back to your captain on the 
field, even if you think he is wrong. Do 
what he tells you to do so far as you are 
able. Remember that strict obedience Is the 
first requisite of a player. 

Don't magnify your bruises. Don't let 
them frighten you. Make up your mind 
quickly as to your condition. If you are not 
really hurt do not waste the sympathy of 
your friends. If you are hurt, tell the cap- 
tain and quit the field. 

Don't be careless about guards, protectors 
or padding over any weak, injured or ex- 
posed part of the body. One afternoon of 
carelessness may cost you the season's play- 
ing. 



CHAPTER III 

THE FIRST SCRIMMAGE 

By this time your team should be picked. 
I do not mean that you should have the team 
that will play out the season, for sometimes 
players who looked promising prove a dis- 
appointment and it is then necessary to make 
a change. But by this time you should have 
a team — even though it be only an experi- 
mental team — on the field for real practice. 

If you have enough players to form two 
teams so much the better. In that case you 
are indeed fortunate, for then you are sure 
of a first and a second eleven, and such a 
combination means plenty of good hard 
scrimmaging. Those on the first team play 
hard because they want to stay on the first 
team, and those on the second team play 

43 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

their hardest because they seek to be elevated 
to the first squad. 

With your team selected and the positions 
filled, the first requisite is signals. Without 
signals there can be no team practice, for 
without signals your own players have no 
way of knowing what play is to be attempted. 
Signals are the force which binds the team 
and knits it into a coherent, smooth, efficient 
machine. 

Signals can be simple or complicated — It 
all depends upon the team. Occasionally you 
will meet with a group of mentally alert 
players who use complicated signals with suc- 
cess. All things considered, though, the best 
signals are those that tell the story to the 
team clearly so that there can be no mistake. 
The worst signals are those that take so much 
study or that are so complicated that the 
players get mixed and are helpless. Some 
think it is smart to have a top-heavy confus- 
ing set of signals. There is nothing smart 
in having a set of signals that half a team 
cannot understand. Signals are planned to 
be a help to a team not a hindrance. It does 

44 



THE FIRST SCRIMMAGE 

not speak well for the brains of a team that 
allows itself to get caught in such a fix. 

Of two evils, It is far better to have your 
opponents sometimes guess what is coming 
than to have your own team confused. When 
confusion strikes your own ranks one player 
goes one way and another player goes an- 
other — and your opponents come through 
and ditch your plans. Simple signals that 
are thoroughly understood are the first 
requisite of smooth team play. Without 
smooth team play you can accomplish abso- 
lutely nothing. 

The simplest form of signals is to number 
the spaces in the forward line. For instance, 
have even numbers on the right side of the 
center and odd numbers on the left side. 
Right at the start, by the simple distinction of 
odd and even, a player cannot fail to com- 
prehend on which side of the center the play 
is to hit. 

Thus number the openings in the line. 
There is an opening outside left end, so call 
that opening i. Between end and tackle on 
the left side becomes 3 ; between left guard 

45 



/ 

FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

and tackle, 5, and between the left guard and 
the center, 7. On the other side the numbers 
follow a similar plan, but are even. Outside 
the right end is 2 ; between right end and 
right tackle, 4; between right tackle and 
guard, 6, and between right guard and the 
center, 8. That's the first stage of a signal 
system. 

Some players are slow with figures. If 
your team has candidates who are of this 
type, it might be well to give them a map 
showing the holes at which plays are directed 
and their numbers: 

Left Left Left Right Right Right 

End Tackle Guard Center Guard Tackle End 

13578642 

You must also number the players in the 
backfield. This is done so that the team will 
know not only where the ball is to go, but 
who is to carry it. Number your left half 
34, your fullback 44, your right half 54, and 
your quarterback 64. 

In calling your signal you must have at 
least one blind number. Suppose, for in- 

46 



THE FIRST SCRIMMAGE 

stance, the quarter should call 63, 34, i. 
The 63 would be a blind number, 34 would 
be the number of the left half and i would 
be the hole at left end. The signal would 
mean that the left half was to carry the ball 
round the left end. The instance I have just 
given you is signalling reduced to baldness. 
It need not be as simple as all that, but it 
should not get far away from such simplicity. 
A little thought will enable signals to be made 
both simple and effective. 

For instance, the blind number c^n be 
made to perform a useful purpose. Many 
teams have a signal with three numbers or 
with four numbers, and the signal is always 
repeated twice, and the start of the play is 
always made when the signals have been 
called the second time. Thus, if a three- 
number signal like the signal I gave you is 
being used, the opposition knows that the 
start will not be made until the end of the 
second call of the signal. Hence the oppo- 
sition Is set for the charge just when it comes. 
It is never caught off guard. 

But suppose we make the blind number a 

47 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

starting signal. Immediately the offensive 
strength of the team becomes greater. Sup- 
pose the quarterback always calls the first 
number with a i, 2 or 3 at the end, as 51, 71, 
82, 22, 33, 93, etc. The i would mean that 
the play would start with the calling of the 
first number when the signal is repeated; the 
2 would mean start on the second number, 
and, of course, the 3 would mean start on 
the third number. 

Now let us say that the quarter calls the 
signal that I previously gave you. He would 
call it the first time; he would call it the 
second; and as soon as he called the i the 
play would get under way and the center 
would snap him the ball. The 3 on the end 
of the 63 would have said to the team '*Get 
going as soon as the third number is called 
on the repetition of the signal." 

But suppose the quarter, facing his backs, 
had called 62, 24, i. The 2 in the 62 would 
mean that the play would start when the 
second number of the repeated signal was 
called. Turning away from his backs, the 
quarter would bend down behind his center. 

48 



THE FIRST SCRIMMAGE 

He would call 62, 24 — and right there the 
center would snap the ball without waiting 
for the I and the line would charge. Your 
opponents, if they do not discover your start- 
ing signal, will never know just when the 
play is to start. They will be kept worried 
and harassed all through the game. 

Another method of signalling is to give 
each play an individual number, and then 
give each player an individual number. 
Then different combinations can be made by 
additions and subtractions. But these are 
generally difficult to master, and my advice, 
not only to boy teams but to shop teams and 
neighborhood teams as well, is to take the 
simplest form of signals and work up from 
these. As you go along and discover the 
possibilities of your team, you can deepen 
the signals to meet their abilities. 

Now that you have your signals, the 
natural question arises: what are you going 
to do with them? There is only one answer 
— ^practice with them. A group of simple 
plays must be mapped out. These should 
consist of runs around the ends, plunges 

49 



/ 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

through the guard-tackle holes, drives at the 
center of the line and perhaps a simple criss- 
cross. Then, having mapped out your plays, 
and your players having become familiar 
with the signals, practice the plays. This is 
generally called a signal drill. 

At the start the signals must be followed 
in a general way with no thought given to 
working out an interference. What you 
want now is to see that the team understands 
the mechanics of the play — ^that the quarter 
gets the ball from the center when he should 
get it, that he passes it to the back who should 
get it, and that every player knows where 
that play is to go. 

At this stage of the practice the candidates 
should walk tfirough the plays. No ; I made 
no mistake there. I said walk, and I meant 
walk. This is done for a day or two until, 
instinctively, they begin to take natural posi- 
tions. 

The next thing is to see that each player 
performs some natural duty for each play. 
For instance, let us presume that the signal 
calls for a run by the left half outside right 

50 



THE FIRST SCRIMMAGE 

tackle. The signal is given, the quarter gets 
the ball and passes it to the back. The full- 
back and the right half must interfere for 
their companion. By that I mean that they 
must run in a line toward the place where 
he is going and that they must run in ad- 
vance of him. They are his body-guard. 
Tkey try to prevent anybody's tackling him. 
They may use their bodies but not their hands 
or arms in their interference. And at the 
same time the right end tries to block off the 
enemy's left tackle. If he accomplishes this, 
if he pushes the tackle away from the play, 
the enemy's left end is left alone to meet 
the play; and the fullback and the right half, 
guarding the runner with the ball, speedily 
take care of him. 

This is simple football, yet it is good prac- 
tice. Bit by bit these simple plays should be 
speeded up. When you have them going fast 
and sure, you can begin to elaborate them. 
At no time, however, should they become so 
complicated that the team finds trouble in 
going through the necessary manceuvers. 
Later I will tell you how to alter these sim- 

51 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

pie plays so as to make them more for- 
midable. 

A simple criss-cross is another play that 
needs lots of practice in the early days. The 
simplest form of this play is to have the 
quarter pass the ball to the left half, say, 
who starts to run toward the right end. But 
as he passes the right half, he deftly slips 
the ball to that player, and the right half 
makes with all his speed towards the left end. 
One reason why plays of this type need a 
lot of practice is that quickness and sureness 
in the handling of the ball are absolutely 
necessary if the play is to succeed. 

By this time your kickers have had plenty 
of limbering up. If they have practiced 
faithfully, if they have refrained from aim- 
less kicking, they should now be able to punt 
with considerable accuracy. 

Now, at last, is the time to let the kicker 
increase his distance. Place him on the 
twenty-yard line and let him kick — not only 
over the bar, but under the bar and also 
above the bar and over the posts. After two 
days of this form of sharpshooting, send him 

52 



THE FIRST SCRIMMAGE 

back five yards for another series of 
kicks. 

All this while he has been kicking from 
directly in front of the posts. Now you 
change your tactics and his angle. You bring 
him in to the fifteen-yard line and station him 
half way toward the side line. He now has 
to kick at an angle that makes his target a 
whole lot smaller and consequently a whole 
lot more difficult to make. After he gets 
this range, he can go back to the twenty, and 
then to the twenty-five yard lines — and next 
we findihim bacK on the fifteen-yard line and 
kicking from the sideline itself. 

By this time the punter, though his best 
effort has never been more than twenty-five 
or thirty yards, will have developed tolerable 
accuracy. So now, with his aim as his great- 
est assest, he should start to kick for distance. 
In this phase of kicking, too, he should know 
where he means to send the ball — and he 
should send it there. If the ends can be told 
by signal — a special signal — into what part 
of the field the kicker intends to drop the 
ball, they can get away ever so much faster 

53 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

and with ever so much more sureness in cov- 
ering the kick. 

Once punting for distance starts, the 
punter should do his kicking after receiving 
the ball from the center. He should get his 
kick away with all the speed he can master. 
In a match game, when the enemy is break* 
ing through to block his kick, a second^s 
delay may be fatal — even part of a second's 
delay may spell the difference between a 
match won and a match lost. The kicker 
must always strike for speed, speed, speed. 
It is a good thing now to have somebody time 
him to see how long it takes him to get the 
ball away. Timing, however, should not be 
done more than twice a week, for too much 
anxiety about the clock makes the kicker 
nervous and over-anxious. 

Regardless of how much interest a player 
shows, punting becomes monotonous if 
taken in too large a dose. So, after the 
punter -has mastered things within the twenty- 
yard line, he may begin to try his hand, or 
his foot, at place kicking. It is a welcome 
change from straight punting. 

54 



THE FIRST SCRIMMAGE 

At the start he can make a nick in the 
ground, set the ball in this depression and 
cock it up well. He should take a couple of 
steps, come with the second step squarely 
upon the standing foot, give an easy swing 
with the other leg and meet the ball with 
the toe a couple of inches from the ground. 
He should take care that the ball and his 
foot are on a line with the center of the 
goal. The nearer the ball is to the goal, 
the more it should be cocked up for the kick. 
Later we will talk about the player who 
holds the ball for the place kick, and the 
easiest way to kick a goal. 

Now that your kicker is punting for dis- 
tance, it is time to make your ends race away 
under the kicks. Let me warn you against 
keeping an end in after he is winded. When 
you overplay him you slow him up, and you 
also slow up the kicker; for seeing that his 
kicks are outdistancing the ends the kicker 
will more or less unconsciously ^^pull" them. 
That is bad. It robs the kicker of the habit 
of always driving the ball as hard as he 
knows how. Use fast ends. Make the 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

kicker kick his best. And when the ends tire 
replace them with fresh players. In this way 
you help both the kicker and his ends. 

Now that your ends are speeding away 
after kicks, it is a good plan to quicken the 
whole team. For this purpose nothing is 
better than short sprints. Line them up. At 
the signal let them go their speediest for 
ten or fifteen yards. Half a dozen sprints 
of this kind, stuck in here and there during 
the practice, will have a wonderful effect on 
the speed of a team. 

Now let us return for a while to your sig- 
nal drill. As you run through your plays 
make sure that every player hits the line at 
the exact spot where he is intended to hit. 
This is especially true of the man who carries 
the ball. If he is told to hit between tackle 
and guard, it does his linemen no good to 
drill a hble for him at that exact spot if he 
hits the line a foot to either side of the spot. 
Between tackle and guard means between 
tackle and guard, not a foot this way or a 
foot that way. It means in between. Line- 
men, interferers and the runners with the ball 

S6 



THE FIRST SCRIMMAGE 

must all hit the same spot with their dynamic 
effort, else all their effort is wasted. 

And now for a final word about your prac- 
tice. When you run through your signals, 
theoretically you are carrying the ball. 
Therefore, it is well for you to know the art 
of opening holes in the line and the science 
of forming effective interference. 

A player whose side has the ball may not 
use his hands or arms, but he is permitted 
to use his shoulders, his head, his neck, his 
hips and his thighs. You ought to know all 
that; it's in the rules. Care should be taken 
that the hole for the runner is not opened 
too soon, and that is the reason for timing 
plays. Some players seem to think that open- 
ing a hole means blasting the opposing play- 
ers out of the way and leaving them pros- 
trate so that they cannot hope to get back 
into the play. As a rule, opening a hole 
merely means getting an opposing player out 
of the way for a few seconds; at the end 
of those few seconds he has recovered his 
poise and is back in the opening. The best 
a runner can hope for is a chance to skin 

57 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

through that opening, before it ceases to 
exist. If the hole is opened too soon, it Is 
generally closed when the runner arrives, or 
else one or two of the enemy's backfield men 
come through and get the runner behind his 
own line. If a hole is opened too late, the 
runner goes up against a dead wall, loses his 
speed, and finds himself off to a flat start 
when the belated hole does appear. 

In opening a hole it is a mistake to get the 
weight too high at the start. Play low at 
the start; and when you do start, make every 
use of head, shoulders, neck, hips and thighs 
that you can. As the play moves straighten 
up with sturdy stiffness. Here you will find 
that your reward has come from those muscle 
stretching exercises given in the first chapter 
of this book. Above all things do not settle 
down, for then your opponent in the line can 
reach over you and perhaps get the runner. 
You should try to open the hole as you would 
a hinged door. As a general thing try to 
push your opponent in and sideways away 
from the play — always sideways away from 
the play. As soon as the runner has gone 

58 



THE FIRST SCRIMMAGE 

through follow him. A player following a 
play IS in position to try to recover the ball 
in case of a fumble. 

Now a word about the interference. To 
amount to anything at all interference must 
be perfectly timed. If it runs willy-nilly it 
will produce a willy-nilly result It must 
reach the objective point an instant ahead of 
the runner. It must be planned out care- 
fully. It must take care absolutely of that 
part of the field where it is hoped to make 
a gain. It must not run wild in the hope 
of achieving something by accident — things 
are not achieved that way. 

On a play between tackle and guard, for 
instance, the interference must reach that 
point prepared to take care of the tackle, 
the guard and even the backfield men, too, 
should that be necessary. An interferer 
must not hesitate to throw himself, in a last 
emergency, at a threatening opponent, but 
he must throw himself so that he cuts the 
man about the knee with his shoulders, thus 
bowling him out of the play. If two or three 
players can be put out so much the better. 

59 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

As a rule, though, the interferer should keep 
on his feet, for once he has gone down he is 
out of the play for good. 

The interferer must never, by shifting 
his feet and pointing his feet, indicate where 
the play is to go. He must start hard, and 
fast, and quick. And the interference must 
endeavor to make the play so that when the 
runner hits the line he hits it not slantingly 
but at right angles. 

Now that you are running through signals, 
some of your plays are bound to be botched. 
Players sometimes have a habit of blaming 
one another for these slips. This is an un- 
fortunate tendency, and a wise captain will 
try to have as little of this as possible. 
Should there be quarrels among the players, 
smooth them out on the field. Do not let 
the players depart with the quarrel still 
rankling, for next day they will be sure to 
appear with a left-over grouch. Quarrels 
among players have wrecked more than one 
team. 

You are now ready for real give-and-take 
scrimmage. But suppose you have no sec- 

60 



THE FIRST SCRIMMAGE 

ond team. Does that make scrimmage im- 
possible? Not at all. With your regular 
team and a few substitutes you can get all 
the work of this sort you can take care of. 
But of that I will tell you later. 

Don't try, if you are tackled, to break the 
forje of your fall by stretching out your 
hand or arm. This is dangerous. Hunch 
your shoulders, pull in your neck, hug the 
ball and take your tumble. Then you will 
be all squeezed up to take the shock. 

Don't give away the play by your atti- 
tude or your movements. Watch yourself 
constantly in this regard. 

Don't play high when you are running as 
part of the interference. When you drop out 
of the interference, meet your opponent as 
hard as possible. 

Don't fail to go down the field under every 
kick. 



CHAPTER IV 

PRACTICE WITHOUT A SCRUB 

A SEASON or two ago I saw a schoolboy 
team of heavy, rangy players defeated by a 
very light team of younger boys. The de- 
feated eleven tried to salve its wounds by 
grumbling that it had no second eleven to 
practice against. The captain of the team 
told me that absence of a second eleven had 
discouraged the players. 

Now, your team may not be made up of 
schoolboys, but you are quite likely to get 
the idea that lacking a *'scrub'' you are 
doomed to a sorry season. Do not let the 
absence of a scrub disturb you in the least. 
Many a team is better off without a second 
eleven, for second elevens have a habit of 
showing up to-day and not showing up to- 

62 



PRACTICE WITHOUT A SCRUB 

morrow, and that makes them worse than 
useless. If you cannot figure on having at 
least twenty-two men out every day — not 
every second or third day, mind, but every 
day — give up all thought of a ''scrub." You 
can get along practically just as well without 
a now-you-have-me-and-now-you-haven't sec- 
ond team. 

Kicking and catching and signal drills do 
not depend upon a second eleven. Neither 
does scrimmage work need a second team If 
it is to grow strong and husky. Blocking, 
breaking through, smashing interference, 
tackling — in fact every thrill that goes with 
a real gridiron battle — can be practiced by 
isimply splitting your eleven in two and add- 
ing a few substitutes. It is easier to get a 
few substitutes than it is to secure eleven 
second-string men. 

The mechanics of the operation are sim- 
ple. Break your line in the center — that is, 
in the middle — and bend it over. Call in 
one of your substitutes and make him a cen- 
ter. Then you will have your regular center 
playing against a scrub center just as he 

^2 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

would were there two teams. Your linemen 
will be meeting with first-team opposition, 
for your left guard will be opposed to your 
right guard, your left tackle to your right 
tackle, and your left end to your right end. 
Your linemen are so fixed that they have all 
the elements of opposition — guard against 
guard, tackle against tackle, end against end. 

There is just one drawback. In case of 
injury it is generally always a first team man 
who suffers the Injury because you have noth- 
ing but first-string men in the game. How- 
ever, you cannot have your cake and eat it. 
Injuries are something that go with the game. 
The main thing is that you have a way in 
which you can build up the all-around play- 
ing skill of your team. 

Right here let me remind you that in prac- 
tice of this sort the plays must all be on 
one side of the field. It would be ridiculous 
to send a backfield man with the ball around 
that side of the center where there would be 
no lineman to oppose him. Because you can 
play only one side, criss-crosses are out of 
the question. 

64 



PRACTICE WITHOUT A SCRUB 

If possible, use two regular backfields so 
that the line can get real practice in meeting 
the charge of backfield interference. In a 
game the entire backfield forms the inter- 
ference with the man with the ball. If, in 
practice, your linemen meet the runner and 
only one or two interferers, when an entire 
backfield storms at them in a game they will 
be lost. 

A split-line formation such as I have de- 
scribed, together with two complete back- 
fields, calls for only sixteen players. It is 
better to have sixteen players who will turn 
out every day, than to have thirty candidates 
only ten of whom can be relied upon. Then, 
too, there is another good point about a small 
squad. It is far easier to correct the mis- 
takes of sixteen players than it is to coach 
thirty. 

Even should but a few players show up 
on a certain day you can get a measure of 
practice. Play your center and your two 
guards against a sub-center and your two 
tackles. Of course, under this arrangement 
all the plays will have to be line drives, and 

65 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

you will have to cut your practice short as 
no group of guards and tackles can stand 
up for long under a system that sends every 
play directly at them. As I told you before 
never play your team to exhaustion. The 
few suggestions I have given you will show 
that there is no end to the plans you can use 
to get practice without a second eleven. 

Suppose, having no second eleven, you de- 
sire to give your kickers practice under fire. 
Do not despair. Even that is possible. Take 
out the tackles and the guards. Leave the 
center and the ends on the line. Your kicker 
stands now with but the flimsiest of protec- 
tion. When the center snaps the ball the 
other line can charge through the holes, and 
your kicker will have to be spry indeed if 
he is to get the ball away. In fact, after the 
kickers become experienced, they should be 
given the ball to kick with no linemen at all 
blocking in front of them. However, when 
kicking plays of this kind are used, the kicker 
must stand back a bit farther than when he 
is kicking behind a full line. And in all this 
work of hurrying the kicker care must be 

66 



PRACTICE WITHOUT A SCRUB 

taken to see that the kicker puts his foot to 
the ball with some idea of where he intends 
to drive it. Merely kicking the ball itself 
is not enough. He might kick it off on a long 
angle and not make an actual gain of ten 
yards. 

The wise team will remember that all this 
practice should be made as real as possible. 
Every player should do his best, and there 
should be strict rulings regarding fouls and 
unfair tactics. If you can find somebody to 
referee for you, kidnap him if necessary to 
stop him from refusing, for he will prove 
a treasure. A team that gets no refereeing 
in practice has a tendency to fall into ways 
of doing things that bring penalties. It is 
better to have a practice referee stamp out 
fouls and unfair tactics than to have a real 
referee in a reail game penalize the team more 
yards than it can make up by its offensive 
play. But if you cannot get a referee, and 
if you know the danger and if you watch your 
team for fouls, you can bring yourself to a 
plane where foul playing will seldom cost you 
a yard. But it is a matter of eternal vigi- 

67 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

lance — or as one rueful player put it ''in- 
fernal vigilance." 

The scrimmage should always be snappy. 
I merely tell you that again because we went 
off on a by-path discussing fouls and pen- 
alties. The big reason why scrimmages 
should be snappy and as real as possible is 
because the habits that the players acquire in 
these practices will later mark them as a 
team. 

Now let me give you a word of warning. 
After all your patient work of learning the 
essentials — such as passing, falling on the 
ball, signals and walking through your plays 
— you will be intensely eager to plunge into 
your scrimmage work. But in that direction 
danger lies. Creep — don't plunge. Scrim- 
mage work for the first few days should be 
very short, not lasting over four or five min- 
utes. It might be possible to repeat these 
five-minute sessions twice in an afternoon. 
After three or four days the time can be 
extended to seven or eight minutes, and 
after a week or two to ten minutes. The 
main thing about scrimmage practice is not 

68 



PRACTICE WITHOUT A SCRUB 

how much of it you can do but, instead, how 
you do it. Make it snappy. It must never 
be long, tedious and careless. 

Once real scrimmage work starts, two hard 
and fast rules must be impressed on every 
player. The first of these is that he must 
keep his eyes on the ball. The second is 
that he must not lose his temper. 

The matter of keeping eyes on the ball 
is not albne a rule of football. It is abso- 
lutely essential for success in any sport. In 
boxing, the person who would glance around 
at the scenery instead of watching his op- 
ponent would soon find himself wondering 
where he had been when the cyclone struck. 
The baseball batter who would allow his 
attention to wander from the business in 
hand would soon find himself decorating the 
bench. Ty Cobb says that he watches the 
ball from the moment the pitcher takes it 
in his hand. In rowing the cry is *'Eyes in 
the boat." Eyes are everything, because 
they signify attention. The football player 
who allows his eyes to wander from the ball 
is often caught off guard when the charge 

69 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

comes. This is particularly true when he is 
on defensive. WATCH THE BALL! 

The player who loses his temper is of abso- 
lutely no use to his team. He dwells on his 
anger when he should be thinking of the 
game. He allows his attention to leave the 
plays. He loses his head and commits fouls; 
but instead of being the only sufferer the 
whole team is penalized with him for his 
action. The referee does not say **Hey, 
Jones, you're offside ; back you go.'' No ; ten 
other men, all of them innocent of wrong, 
go back with Jones and suffer for his act. 
A football player to be worth his salt must 
be able to take a hard knock without losing 
his self-control. 

Many a game is lost because a goal was 
not kicked after a touchdown was scored. 
Consult the record books and you will be 
surprised to see how many games are lost in 
that way. There was some excuse for the 
failure to kick a goal when the angle was diffi- 
cult or when the wind makes accurate kick- 
ing almost impossible. But there is no ex- 
cuse now for missing a try when a touchdown 

70 



PRACTICE WITHOUT A SCRUB 

has been scored, for under the new rules all 
the kicker has to do is to lift the ball over 
the bar from a point directly in front of the 
goal posts. 

There is a simple formula for making this 
kick so that the ball rarely if ever misses. 
The kick is a close kick — that is, it is made 
not far from the goal line. For that reason 
the ball should be cocked up to enable it 
to rise rapidly in the air. We will assume 
that the kicker is one who kicks with his 
right foot. This, then, is what he does : 

He takes one step forward and plants his 
left foot by the side of the ball and almost 
even with it. 

With a simple swing of the right foot, the 
foot itself, the ankle and the leg kept on 
a line with the center of the goal posts, he 
gently lifts the ball over. 

No fuss, no feathers, no flurry, no excite- 
ment. Just a simple swing of the right foot. 
With practice a player will soon be able to 
make this kick one of deadly accuracy. 

So far we have considered only the player 
who kicks the ball in a place kick. Now let 

71 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

us consider another very important member 
of the place-kicking partnership — the man 
who holds the ball. There must be absolute 
understanding and sympathy between the 
two players. The placer must possess, above 
all things, nerves that are quiet and steady, 
for it requires poise and a steady hand to 
place the ball on the ground quickly and 
lightly and without any variation in its aim 
or in its position. 

The placer holds the ball with the fore- 
finger and second finger of one hand on the 
top at the upper part of the end of the lac- 
ing. The fingers of the other hand hold the 
ball the same distance from a middle point, 
but back towards the kicker. The kicker 
is the sole judge of the kick itself. The 
placer makes no attempt to aim or to con- 
strue the ball's flight. All the placer is there 
for is to manipulate the ball according to the 
judgment of the kicker. The kicker gives 
the directions as to how the ball is to be 
aimed, and in this he uses such expressions as 
''Cock it up," ''Don't cock it up so much," 
"Lacing toward you," "Point away from 

72 



PRACTICE WITHOUT A SCRUB 

you," 'Toint toward you," etc., until he has 
the leather pointed exactly as he wants it. 

Then the kicker says "Steady!" The next 
instant he says **Down!" There must be no 
wait between the **Steady" and the '*Down." 
No unnecessary strain must be put upon the 
placer. 

At the word *'Down" the placer with- 
draws his under hand and rests the ball's 
point. He gently steadies the ball with the 
fingers of the other hand, and it is here that 
calm nerves count for so much. He does 
not take the fingers away but permits the 
ball to be kicked out from under them. The 
kicker, watching the ball as it goes down, 
meets it confidently with that swinging right 
foot and drives it over. 

While we are on the subject of kicking let 
me remind you that the weather has much to 
do with kicking, and so, too, does the new- 
ness of the ball affect this angle of the game. 
There are two rules that the kicker must al- 
ways remember. 

First — A wet, soggy ball must be cocked 
up more than a dry one. 

73 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

Second — A new ball should also be well 
pointed up as it travels low and fast, and the 
wind does not lift it as would be the case 
were the ball old and more or less round. 

And now a final word of warning. See 
that there is thorough sympathy between 
the kicker and the placer. The kicker can 
do much to keep the placer at the right pitch 
— and much that will break him and make 
him useless. For one thing, the kicker 
should never become hurried and impatient 
in giving his orders. If the placer is shaky, 
as sometimes happens when he has been in 
the heat of the plays that have just scored, 
the kicker should let him take up the ball 
and wait for him to steady down. There is 
no need of hurry as the time consumed in a 
try at goal is taken out. 

Now let's go back to scrimmage work. I 
know that's what you're waiting to start. 

If your scrimmage practice is to be of any 
help to you, the linemen must have knowl- 
edge of blocking and of breaking through. 
Unless they know this end of their business 
— and it sums up most of their business — 

74 



PRACTICE WITHOUT A SCRUB 

they will merely be so many sticks to be 
bowled over and pulled about by wiser op- 
ponents. Let us consider blocking first. I 
am talking now to the linemen : 

The first requisite is that you shall be so 
firmly planted upon your feet that your busy 
opponent cannot push you, or pull you, or 
unsteady you. For you to go off balance 
even for an instant means that your opponent 
has his chance to get past you, and if he has 
been clever enough to unbalance you he will 
probably have agility enough to skin through 
your line past you before you can recover 
yourself. Though you must be firmly 
planted, you must not get so solidly set that 
you cannot move quickly and easily in any 
direction. This may seem like putting Do 
and Don't into the same box and telling them 
to fight it out, but in reality this matter of 
poise is one that is quickly mastered. 

The center and the guards should stand 
with the rear foot almost up to the other foot, 
within a foot, say, and not with the rear 
foot stretched way back as is usually the 
case. The tackles should stand with one foot 

75 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

behind the other after the fashion of a run- 
ner who is getting set. The toe of the rear 
shoe should be more nearly in line with the 
heel of the forward shoe. 

Of course, these positions are open to 
slight change. The player should practice 
until he finds the position that best suits him ; 
provided, of course, that the position allows 
him to get away quickly and enables him to 
stay firmly planted on his pins despite the 
onslaught of his opponent. 

One position there is that should never be 
assumed, and that is the straddle. A player 
in this position cannot start quickly, is easily 
put off balance, and cannot recover quickly. 
The linemen should stand on their toes rather 
than on their heels. There is strategy in this. 
If you are on your toes and the charge of 
your opponent becomes too hot, you can go 
back to your heels for a brace. 

Keep as close to your opponent as possible. 
Wherever he goes, if you are playing end 
or tackle, follow. The guards can never 
go very far after their man. They have a 
greater duty, and it comes first. It is up to 

76 



PRACTICE WITHOUT A SCRUB 

them to block rigidly so that the quarter- 
back can get the pass away. 

Watch the eyes of your opponent, not his 
feet or his belt. In spite of all he can do to 
control them, his eyes will tell his intention 
in advance of his movements. Keep your 
head up, and your body low. In this way 
you are prepared to lift your opponent and 
carry him back. Keep your head high so that 
he cannot grasp it. Should he get past you, 
follow him at once. Once past you he has 
penetrated your team's defenses and is in 
a position to throw a runner for a loss. Run 
into him. Block him off before he can 
tackle. 

It may seem like conflicting advice to tell 
you first to watch the ball, and next to watch 
your opponent. But you have two eyes, and 
with practice you can make them do duty. 
It isn't nearly as difficult as it sounds. 

When you are blocking close to the line 
do not yield an inch. You are supposed to be 
a veritable stone wall against which your 
opponent must knock his poor head in vain. 
Be careful that he does not get a grip on 

77 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

your outside arm, for if that happens he can 
pull you aside and presto I be past you. 
Brace yourself not only against a backward 
push, but also against a forward pull or a 
sideways lunge. In short, you must be ready 
for anything and everything. Always block 
your man away from the play. Do not make 
the mistake that most inexperienced players 
make of reaching too far with the body. 
Wherever your body goes, your legs and 
your arms must go. And no matter where 
you go or by what process you get there, 
either willingly or against your will, keep 
your feet under you. The man who loses his 
feet in football is absolutely down and out so 
far as that particular play is concerned. 

Now we come to breaking through. 

This is an important part of football. The 
team that breaks through is the team that 
stops the man with the ball behind his own 
goal line. When linemen succeed in break- 
ing through they often threaten the quarter- 
back before he can accomplish his pass. 
Even if they are too late for that, they fluster 
the quarterback and his pass is likely to go 

78 



PRACTICE WITHOUT A SCRUB 

wrong, or they fluster the backfield men so 
thJ^t they are likely to fumble. And even if 
none of all this happens, and the ball is 
handled cleanly, they are behind the enemy's 
line before its offensive play has got fairly 
started. 

There is a saying in football that if a 
runner is never tackled until he reaches the 
line it is impossible to stop a gain of ten 
yards in four downs. So it is the line that 
breaks through, or jams back its opponents, 
that stops the other side's advance. 

Of all the linemen the tackles are the play- 
ers from whom the most must be expected 
when it comes to breaking through. They 
are the dynamiters. Two lines of action 
must be followed by the tackle when he goes 
through. He must be ready to set, or he 
must be ready to pursue. If he finds the 
play on his side of the center he should rip 
the interference and, if possible, get the run- 
ner. If the play is going around the other 
side— BUT NOT UNTIL HE IS ABSO- 
LUTELY SURE IT IS GOING AROUND 
THE OTHER SIDE— he should race after 

79 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

the runner and try to get him from behind. 

The tackle, unlike other linemen, never 
waits to see where the play is going but jams 
forward. He goes through as hard as he 
can; and once through, he acts according to 
what he finds behind the line. Once through 
he must make up his mind on the spot. 

The guards are the linemen who do prac- 
tically no breaking through. They, with the 
center, must always form a barrier behind 
which the quarterback can operate. The 
fact that they must hold so strongly is an- 
other reason why the tackles must get 
through so quickly. The guards can, and 
must, charge their opponents back, but they 
never follow them. 

One good way to go through is to strike 
your opponent on one side as though you 
were going that way and then dart by him 
quickly on the other side. Play for his out- 
side arm, just as earnestly as you try to pre- 
vent his getting hold of yours. If you catch 
his arm, in his efforts to free himself he will 
most likely pull you through, and that is just 
exactly where you want to go. If he is stand- 
So 



PRACTICE WITHOUT A SCRUB 

ing too high, go into him with hands ex- 
tended and strike his chest; if he is too low, 
take him by the head and pull him to one side 
or the other. 

By this time you are probably finding that 
the thing that you are told not to let your 
opponent do to you, you are expected to do 
to your opponent. That's the case exactly. 
In the line practically every player is fenc- 
ing with his opponent. 

There are a great many ways by which 
you can break through, but the best way is 
to study your man, find out his weakness, 
and do not always try to break through in 
the same way. Vary your methods. Go 
into action the moment the ball is snapped. 
Keep at arm's length from your opponent. 
When you start, go through with your anri 
well extended. This will help to stop youti 
being bowled over by an interf erer. 

Do not scrap with your opponent. If he 
tries to play horse with you, remember he is 
acting so as to make you lose your temper. 
Keep yourself under control. 

Don't slug. Scrapping is not football. 
8i 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

Don't wait for the opposing runner. He 
may disappoint you. Break through and stop 
him. 

When about to tackle, keep your eyes on 
the runner's hips. 

Don't stop if you miss a tackle. Keep 
after your man. You have more reason now 
to bring him down than you had before. 

Don't talk to your opponent. There's 
plenty of time for conversation after the 
game. 



CHAPTER V 

THE LINE AND THE FORWARD PASS 

With the development of football has 
come a new feature, the forward pass. In 
the hands of a team that has perfected itself 
in this form of aerial attack, the play is one 
calculated to spread havoc in the ranks of 
the opposing side. But because it is a play 
that demands great skill, practice in forward 
(passing should begin early in the season — 
the earlier the better. 

The forward pass is no longer an ex- 
periment. With the development of the 
game along more open lines it has become 
of great importance— not as a hit-or-miss 
chance as many teams have played it in the 
past, but as a well developed means of at- 
tack. Not only does it offer chances for long 

83 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

jgains, but it serves as a threat to keep the 
opposing backfield men from backing up the 
line too closely on running plays. When 
you consider its power to make the opposing 
backfield chary of playing in, you will begin 
to understand the importance of early and 
consistent practice. For, whereas the for- 
ward pass IS a powerful offensive weapon in 
the hands of a skilled team, bunglers can 
easily make it the cause of their own undo- 
ing. It Is one of these plays that create con- 
sternation in your opponent's ranks when it 
succeeds and can wreck your own team's 
poise when it fails. Someone has likened the 
play to d5mamite — ^used to advantage by 
those who understand it, but suicide to those 
who don't. 

Your quarterback and your backfield men 
are the players to throw forward passes, and 
they must learn to throw them with skill and 
accuracy. Here is a point of play that re- 
quires the greatest skill in its execution. In- 
stead of throwing the passes aimlessly in the 
wild hope that one of them will sometimes 
come off, the forward pass must be just as 

84 



THE LINE AND THE FORWARD PASS 

definitely planned as the end run or the play 
off tackle. 

Forward passes are of two kinds, the lob 
pass and the spiral. The lob is tossed or 
thrown end over end, and describes more or 
less of an arc in the air. The spiral is thrown 
like a spear and goes more nearly on a line 
and with far greater speed. 

Both take practice. However, of the two, 
the spiral offers the greater obstacle, and it 
sometimes happens that a player takes quite 
some little time in acquiring the knack. The 
ball should be held in the hand and speared 
through the air by giving the hand a twist 
as the ball leaves it. At first, some aid can 
be secured by using the fingers on the lacing; 
but when once a man has acquired the trick, 
it will be found that grasp of the ball will 
be sufHcient to give him the desired grip. 

In seeking to acquire proficiency In the 
spiral, the backfield men will sometimes neg- 
lect the lob pass. This is a serious mistake 
for it is often necessary to make this pass 
with considerable accuracy. The lob is ef- 
fective when it is necessary to throw a long, 

8s 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

high pass down the field so that players will 
have time to congregate at a certain point, 
that certain point being the place where the 
ball will fall. It takes practice to throw the 
ball high and far, but it takes even more 
practice to throw it so that it will go where 
it should go. In baseball speed and curves 
are useless to a pitcher if he loses control. 
In throwing the pass control is just as im- 
portant. 

Forward passing and kicking have this in 
common — ^both demand a target. In kick- 
ing as soon as the man has found his foot and 
his foot found the ball he kicks at a target. 
In forward passing the same theory prevails 
as soon as the knack of passing has been 
mastered. But whereas in kicking the player 
boots the ball at a stationary target, in for- 
ward passing he uses both a player standing 
and a player running. 

Does all this sound hard and discourag- 
ing? You will be surprised, if you really 
practice mastering the knack, how quickly it 
will come to you. 

There are two factors to a forward pass, 
86 



THE LINE AND THE FORWARD PASS 

the man who throws the pass and the man 
who catches it. The two ends and all the 
backfield men must get lots of work taking 
forward passes on the run. Infinite skill 
can be acquired in this form of catching, and 
very often this skill will be responsible for 
a victory. The first score for Pittsburg in 
the intersectional contest with Georgia Tech. 
was due to the way in which a Pittsburg back 
on the dead run managed to catch a forward 
pass that seemed to have gone quite beyond 
his reach. A long, high lob pass made by the 
Yale back, Veeder, and well taken by the 
Yale end, Alcott, enabled Yale to win over 
Harvard the first year of the introduction 
of this play. I happen to know that both 
Veeder and Alcott spent days and weeks of 
practice in making and receiving this pass. 

West Point won from Annapolis in a year 
when Annapolis was supposed to be very 
strong simply because a West Point end, 
Merrilat, had by long practice made himself 
so proficient that he could go down the field 
and take a forward pass thrown clear to the 
goal line. So I say to you again, practice, 

87 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

practice, practice, on this play that has such 
great possibilities of bringing victory. 

But with the defensive tactics employed by 
teams of to-day, a forward passing game is 
not of much use unless it is founded upon 
a good, strong running attack — an attack so 
strong that the secondary defense (the back- 
field men) are tempted to come up and sup- 
port the line. Hence, the ideal attack is a 
combination of the two styles of play. There 
must be a running play strong enough to 
force the secondary defense to come up. 
Then, when they do come up, there must be 
a forward pass play that starts from the 
same formation but quickly develops into 
its own channel and catches the opposing 
team unprepared and off its guard. The 
beauty of this strong combination attack is 
thus revealed in this fashion: 

If the secondary defense does not come up, 
the running attack keeps gaining ground. 

If the secondary defense, in desperation, 
does come up, a forward pass sweeps it off 
its feet. 

It is one of those instances in which the 
88 



THE LINE AND THE FORWARD PASS 

other fellow gets it going and coming. 

A forward pass may also be masked by 
an appearance of a kick. In this lie great 
possibilities. 

There is one other phase of the play that 
has, as yet, not been developed, and it is a 
phase in which the possibilities are almost 
limitless. I have in mind an individual run- 
ner going out on an end and determining, 
by conditions as he finds them, whether to 
go on and make his run or throw a pass to 
another player. It takes great nerve for a 
player to go straight out around his end pre- 
tending he is going to throw a pass, perhaps 
even fooling his own end, and then going on 
with a good dash of speed. If you ever 
decide to try this play, pick a runner in whose 
judgment and coolness you have faith. If 
what he decides to do proves disastrous, do 
not growl or grumble. Should you ever elect 
to try this, be prepared to abide cheerfully 
by the result. You are taking a chance, and 
if you lose be a good loser. 

I said at the start that forward passes are 
of two kinds. Perhaps I should have said 

89 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

three. There is also the underhand pass, 
but this requires very little practice. It is 
simply an underhand toss, and it is used for 
a short distance to get past an incoming end. 
One of the great advantages of mastering the 
forward passing game is that your team has 
a powerful weapon to use against heavier 
teams. But by mastering I do not merely 
mean the ability to pass the ball and receive 
it — I mean that you so mask your forward 
passing plays that your opponents never 
know when they are coming. I have seen a 
team of boys, mostly under seventeen years, 
defeat a team of soldiers who greatly out- 
weighed them. How did they do it? By the 
accuracy and the skilled concealment of their 
forward passes. 

Let me warn you, though, that the for- 
ward pass is difficult, in fact, almost impos- 
sible, when playing on a wet field or while 
rain is falling. If the ball is slimy and wet, 
it is almost impossible to control it in the 
throwing and the catching. 

Before I leave the subject of spirals, it 
might be well to mention that sometimes 

90 



THE LINE AND THE FORWARD PASS 

centers give the ball a spiral twist with the 
thumb and fingers when they pass it far 
back to a backfield man who is to kick. This 
spiral twist, given to the ball as they send 
it back, adds to its speed and also to its dis- 
tance. 

Now let us consider a player who has much 
to do with the forward passing game, but 
who also has his part in almost every play 
his team makes. I mean the end. 

Develop as many ends as you can. It is 
impossible to have too many. His work is 
so gruelling, so exacting, that his strength 
is used up fast. If you will study the sum- 
maries of the big college football matches, 
you will find that in most cases there are 
more necessary substitutions for ends than 
for any other position. 

In fact, the end has so many duties, and 
they dove-tail so closely with the work of 
other men on the team, that an eleven can 
be made or marred in this one position alone. 
Give a team nine stars and two poor ends 
and it will lose most of its games. The 
other men may be said to be the door, and 
91 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

the ends the hinges. If the hinges are rusty 
the whole door squeaks. 

Runs outside tackle are a large part of 
football. The end is the man who must be 
responsible for stopping nine-tenths of these 
runs. As he plays them, maneuvers them, 
jockeys them, so do they succeed or fail. 

On the other hand, when his team has the 
ball, he is the man who largely makes pos- 
sible any scoring run by his own backfield 
men. He belongs to the forward line, and 
yet he is working a great deal of the time 
with the backfield men. He fills to a T 
that old-time definition of hash: a little of 
everything. 

It would seem that by this time he had 
accumulated enough of work for any one 
player, but his is the added business of going 
down the field under punts. Half the 
coaches along the side line, in a big college 
game, shiver with nervousness when the end 
goes charging down toward some man who 
stands there waiting to receive a kick, and 
their shiver is caused by the fear that the 
end may miss his man and permit a long run 

92 



THE LINE AND THE FORWARD PASS 

back. Not only in these runs under punts 
must he be fast, but his speed and all else 
must be controlled so that the man who 
catches the ball will not be able to sidestep 
him or pass him. Here is the place, in this 
ticklishness of going down under punts, when 
his ability as a fast, sure tackier shines in all 
its glory. 

Very often the end becomes the leader or 
director of a play. This is a chance for 
which every end should keep his eyes open 
and be prepared. As I told you in a pre- 
vious chapter he is in a position, from his 
place far out at the end, to see what is going 
on behind the opponent's line. When his 
side has the ball and a play comes off, he is 
in a position to see the opportunities long 
before they are apparent to the man carrying 
the ball. His first business, of course, is 
to check his opponent. After that he can go 
through, lead the runner through to the sec- 
ondary defense, and sometimes enable him 
to also get past this danger. 

All phases of the end's work are ticklish. 
But breaking up or meeting interference is 

93 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

his toughest job. Some ends have an in- 
stinctive quality for this work, and such men 
are football jewels. The end who lacks this 
instinctive quality must be taught, and it is 
here that difficulty arises. 

For breaking up interference can be lik- 
ened to plunging through men and scattering 
them like chaff and in the end reaching or 
meeting a sought object. But in football, 
the men the end has against him are not 
chaff by any means, and consequently it is 
easier to tell how the thing should be done 
than to show how it should be done. 

He has the advantage of using his hands 
and arms; his offensive opponents have not. 
But they are many to his one. They strike 
him from all sides and endeavor to hold him 
off or to upset his balance. And all the while 
the man with the ball is coming at full speed, 
the ball under one arm, the other hand and 
arm ready for straight-arm work. 

In spite of all this the end must get his 
man. If he cannot do this he must force him 
to turn inside toward the tackles and the 
guards. If he stops ^he runner the play is 

94 



THE LINE AND THE FORWARD PASS 

over then and there. If he turns him in a 
lineman or a backfield man stops the run. 

But if he lets the runner circle him In 

that event it may be a ten-yard run, a fifteen- 
yard run, or a run for the full length of the 
field. 

When the end goes in to rout the inter- 
ference and get the runner, the same rule 
that applied to him in the line again applies 
to him. In the line it is one eye on the ball, 
the other on his opponent. Now it is one 
eye on the man with the ball, and the other 
on the interferers. In all that clamor and 
scramble he must keep his head cool and re- 
fuse to be rattled. He must squirm and twist 
and worm and dodge, pushing here, pulling 
there, but always keeping his feet. And if 
he should find himself going down, he should 
make a supreme effort to throw himself so 
that he cuts one or more of the interferers 
down with him and if possible drives them 
back upon the runner. Very often a promis- 
ing play can be ruined by having some inter- 
ferer sent crashing back toward a man he 
set out to guard. The runner has trouble 

95 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

enough dodging his opponents. When he has 
to go to right or left to escape his own back- 
reeling interferers, his case is made hope- 
less. 

Are we through with the end? Oh, no; 
there are still things left for an end to do. 

Sometimes he drops back, acts as a back- 
field man and runs with the ball. 

He may also be the recipient of the second 
pass on a criss-cross. 

He may have to fake a play and then 
slip unexpectedly through and get a pass in 
an unusual position, perhaps back of the 
center. 

Occasionally, after fooling his opponent, 
he may race around behind the quarter, take 
the ball, and then go tearing out around the 
opposite end or through a hole on the other 
side of center. Some years ago, in a game 
against Stevens, Rutgers worked this play 
with deadly effect. 

Taken all in all, the time spent on an end 
IS never wasted. 

The end must be a flash of speed, but 
that does not mean that the balance of the 

96 



THE LINE AND THE FORWARD PASS 

line may be lumbering. The line, on of- 
fensive, must make its charge evenly. The 
moment the ball is snapped the line must 
move, not hesitatingly or ragged, but power- 
fully and in unison. A ragged charge will 
never do much toward advancing the ball. 
Train your line to work together. This is 
one of the easiest things to accomplish if it 
is insisted upon day in and day out in prac- 
tice. Once let an opposing line know that 
certain of your forwards are slow to get 
started and those positions are doomed. 

The work of the end indicates just how 
much importance is attached to cooperation. 
There is another form of cooperation — har- 
mony in a team. When a team is winning 
consistently there is little danger of quarrel- 
ing going on. Sometimes a star player gets 
what we call a **big head" and the other 
players object to his attitude that all is de- 
pendent upon him, but while the team is win- 
ning this trouble is endured. But let the team 
start to lose, let the soreness of defeat chafe 
a team's spirits, and then the big-headed 
player causes a revolution. Right from the 

97 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

start of the season a captain should combat 
any spirit of *'I am IT." Every effort should 
be made to build up that fine spirit of 
Dumas' three guardsmen, **One for all and 
all for one.'' 

When defeat comes, the reason for defeat 
must be found. If any lesson is to be learned 
from defeat, the team must be brought to- 
gether and brought to a condition where they 
understand why they were defeated, what 
points were missed, what players failed to 
follow their instructions, what players failed 
in interference, why a certain play did not 
go, why the opponents were able to put over 
their plays. Here you have a fruitful field 
for developing bad spirit in a team, for al- 
most invariably one player will seek to blame 
another or else those censured will sit sullen 
and silent under criticism. 

What is needed in a case like this is a 
captain with tact. He can accomplish won- 
'ders by showing, and by making the players 
believe, that the whole matter is impersonal 
and that the only vital point is that every 
player must understand the reason the team's 

98 



THE LINE AND THE FORWARD PASS 

colors were lowered. If the players brought 
to account for their playing misdeeds, will 
talk up freely and without rancor and dis- 
cuss their lapses, and if the men will get the 
feeling that they did make mistakes but that 
they will never be repeated, then the teami 
has more chance of advancing because of a 
defeat than it would have had of advancing 
had it won. 

^'All for one and one for all." That's 
the greatest spirit any team can have. 

It simply means playing the game. 



CHAPTER VI 

THE LINE' 

It has often been said, and there is a large 
measure of truth in the saying, that no foot- 
ball team was ever first class that did not 
have a good line. 

It has also often been said that football 
strategy is somewhat akin to the strategy of 
warfare — and that, too, is a true saying. In 
warfare, the object of every army is to take 
the war into enemy territory and safeguard 
its own borders. In football, the perfect line 
keeps the fighting in the other team's terri- 
tory. It refuses to give an inch when it is 
attacked, and plunges through when it under- 
takes the offensive. By withstanding the 
charges of the opposing team, it safeguards 
its own goal line just as an army safeguards 

100 



THE LINE 

Its borders. By carrying the ball into the 
other team's territory it is always on the 
point of carrying it through to victory. A 
football line can thus be measured. 

No matter how remarkable the men in the 
backfields may be they will accomplish little 
if handicapped with a poor line. The line 
must be able to do two things: it must be 
able to play back of the opposing team by 
carrying the opposing line back; second, it 
must be able to protect its own backfield men 
until they get started. If a line cannot do 
those two things, the most wonderful set of 
runners will fail to win games. 

The work of the line need not be showy. 
But it must, at all stages of the game, be cer- 
tain. 

When a line, on defensive, begins to let 
opposing runners through, a tremendous 
amount of extra work is thrown upon the 
backfield. The result is obvious. The back- 
field becomes exhausted and the men lose 
heart, and strength, and stamina. As a re- 
sult, when the ball is at last secured on downs 
or as the result of a caught punt, the backs 

lOI 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

have no reserve strength with which to at- 
tack. 

Viewing the other side of the picture, 
when the good line so crowds the opposing 
line that the opposing backfield men are 
forced to come up and support that line, then 
the opposing backfield lacks the punch when 
Its turn comes to attack. All of which leads 
to another truthful saying of football: 

Either you carry the battle to the other 
fellow or he will carry the battle to you. 

There is still another way of emphasizing 
the importance of the line. When the enemy 
has the ball you have no chance to score un- 
less some member of the opposing team 
should go suddenly crazy and run back of his 
own goal line and score you a safety touch- 
down. Hence, the first thing to do is to 
take the ball away from the enemy. This 
can be accomplished only if your line holds 
and hurls back the enemy's attack. If the 
enemy can keep advancing ten yards in each 
four downs it will never lose a game — and 
you will never win one. 

And if, when your team has the ball, your 

102 



THE LINE 

line permits the opposing line to filter through 
and get your backfield runner before he can 
get fairly started, you will never win a game 
— and the opposing team will never lose one. 

The man with the ball, as I told you in 
another chapter, should be tackled or stag- 
gered before he reaches the line with the ball. 
If he is never touched or tackled until he 
reaches the line, it is seldom that he will not 
go his ten yards in four tries. 

It behooves every captain to pick good 
men for the line positions. To do this he 
must understand the points of play of each 
position, and the men must be taught these 
points of play. 

The first and cardinal principle of a line- 
man's work is to remember that when his 
team is on defensive — that is, when the op- 
posing team has the ball — he has a right to 
use his hands and arms in trying to break 
through to get at the runner. On the other 
hand, when his own team has possession of 
the ball, he can only use his body, his shoul- 
ders, his hips and his arms, and his arms 
must be kept close to his side when interfer- 
103 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

ing or opening holes. At first sight it would 
seem impossible to open a hole without using 
hands and arms, but with practice quite a 
degree of skill can be mastered. The pret- 
tiest thing to see in a good line is the thor- 
oughgoing way in which this principle is 
applied. The good line is never penalized 
for violating this rule, and yet It makes full 
use of its opportunity. It may seem a waste 
of time to speak of this matter in view of the 
fact that every football player is supposed 
to know the rules. And yet, if you keep care- 
ful statistics of games you witness, you will 
find that sometimes a team loses a game sim- 
ply because of the amount of ground lost as 
the result of penalties inflicted because of 
violations by a sloppy line. If you have five 
yards to go on third down and your line vio- 
lates and the team is penalized, all the 
ground gained by the first two downs is 
thrown away and wasted. Let this happen 
five or six times in a game and you can see 
what it means. 

It is bad enough indeed for a lineman to 
get offside on a first down in midfield, but 
104 



THE LINE 

there is nothing very serious about It. When, 
however, a team is making Its way with a 
consistent succession of effective plays In the 
opponents' territory, and that goal line Is 
coming nearer and nearer, and with only a 
yard to go on fourth down, the lineman 
charges and gets offside and a penalty of five 
yards Is Inflicted, it Is well nigh fatal for 
the chances of that coming touchdown. And 
another thing that Is, In the average game, 
practically never made up except by a re- 
markably lucky long forward pass, is a 
penalty under similar condition for holding 
which sets a team back fifteen yards, and 
leaves them an almost Impossible chance of 
holding the ball. With value of possession of 
the ball so great as It is In the modern game, 
these blunders may mean the difference be- 
tween victory and defeat. 

The second thing In the development of a 
line Is to see that It has a good, hard charge, 
that It Is solid on its feet and that it cannot 
be smothered. In a previous chapter I have 
told you of the ideal position to be assumed 
by the men on the line. 
105 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

By this time your team is taking its regular 
scrimmage practice as a matter of course. 
The men have got the feel of the game. 
They are at home in their duties. Now — or 
sooner if you can get to it — is the time to 
begin to develop the individual work of the 
players and, eradicating their faults, bring 
about coordination. 

Line the scrub against the first team — if 
you have no scrub, break your line in the 
middle as I told you to do in an earlier 
chapter — and make one side block while the 
other side tries to break through on the snap 
of the ball. By matching one line do one 
thing over and over again, and the other line 
do another thing over and over again, faults 
of the individual players that were not noticed 
when plays were mixed will begin to stand 
out because the player will be committing the 
same fault every time. After your line has 
had its breaking-through faults corrected, 
put it on holding and correct whatever faults 
are found at this angle of the game. If you 
do this sort of practice honestly and con- 
sistently, you will be astonished at the im- 
io6 



THE LINE 

provement that will be manifest in a short 
time. 

Now let us consider the play of the line 
as a whole. After that we can dwell briefly 
on the individual positions. 

The three middle-men of the line — the 
center and the two guards — must keep fairly 
in touch each with the other when the op- 
ponents have the ball. By that I mean that 
while they must occupy just as much width 
of space of ground as possible they must be 
sure to keep that territory tight so that it is 
practically impossible to catapult through 
them. This forces the runner with the ball 
to go to the outside where the rangy, active 
tackle can get a chance at him. If any of 
these three center men lunges through — 
**knifes" through, as it is called — he opens 
a door on either side of him. The opposing 
man in the line, knowing from the signal 
just where the play is going, can so manipu- 
late this charge of the defensive guard or 
center as to force him in the wrong direc- 
tion. The hole that the man in the line 
has left by knifing through now becomes a 
107 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

yawning cavity. For your own satisfaction 
illustrate this point in your practice scrim- 
mages. Have one of your middle-men knife 
through. You will quickly see what ad- 
vantage the scrub team will take of the op- 
portunity. 

On offense the three middle-men should 
charge forward aggressively, though the 
center does not move until after he has pro- 
tected the pass to the quarterback. In their 
charge, they should keep their space of 
ground unbroken and thoroughly closed up. 

The tackles, of course, are more free in 
their actions, but they should always en- 
deavor on defense to drive the runner in 
toward those solid center-men rather than 
let the runner circle them to the outside. By 
forcing the runner toward the congested 
center, they add strength to the defense, for 
should the runner get by the guards and the 
center, there waits a secondary ready to 
bring him down and prevent a long run. 

On blocking — that is, keeping the opposing 
side from breaking through when your side 
has the ball — a tight middle line is absolutely 
io8 



THE LINE 

essential. That middle line must be blocked 
like rock so that the quarterback has ample 
time to pass the ball with accuracy. In hard 
blocking the middle-men must realize that 
the idea is to get their opponents just below 
the center of gravity as they come in, if pos- 
sible hooking them and lifting them back 
or out of the way. Sometimes, if the oppos- 
ing middle-men are weak, they may be 
charged directly from in front and forced 
straight back, but that is. unusual. When the 
signal calls for a drive through the oppos- 
ing center, the middle-men must protect the 
quarterback for an instant and then hook 
their opponents or else force them off bal- 
ance and split a quick opening through which 
the runner can come. There are two kinds 
of openings: the quick lunge, and the longer 
cumulative charge. Of these I will tell you 
later in this chapter. 

In these days of forward pass, there is an- 
other opportunity still for middle-men to 
make themselves of use in shift plays. For 
instance, it is quite possible to so shift the 
line suddenly as to leave the center man the 
109 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

end man and thus available to receive a for- 
ward pass. One of Michigan's great plays 
devised by Yost was characterized by this 
method. The line shifted leaving the center 
on the end, and he passed the ball back, and 
there was a double pass in the backfield. 
Meantime, the center was hurrying down the 
field and the delay by the double handling of 
the ball, and a partial run across the field, 
was such as to enable him to cover nearly 
half the field, where he received a long for- 
ward pass. The same play can be worked 
with a guard on the end of the line, and this 
development of it leaves a possibility of a 
quick run on the short side, almost a line 
plunge between center and guard. In case the 
opponents leave an opening. 

Now let us consider the individual posi- 
tions and how their play changes on offensive 
and defensive. About the end I told you in 
the last chapter. I might, however, add this. 
Some players In football are what we call 
^'brittle"; In other words, they get hurt 
easily. A man to make a good end must be 
the type that does not bow to injuries. He 
no 



THE LINE 

must be tough fibered. The end gets caught 
in such a tangle of plays that this toughness 
is a prime requisite. The best end in the 
world, from a standpoint of skill, is useless to 
his team when he's hobbling around the side- 
lines with one ankle bandaged or with an arm 
in a sling. 

Somebody has called the tackle the first 
lieutenant to the end. That does not mean 
that he simply helps the end. He has a 
highly specialized position of his own, but 
his work must be closely correlated to that 
of the end, arid there must be a perfect under- 
standing between them. This can come only 
with practice. As they get to know each 
other they can adopt a simple signal code of 
their own by which each, on defensive, can 
let the other know what he intends to do. 
If the tackle, almost at the moment of the 
center passing the ball, smells a forward pass 
and determines to shoot through and try to 
overwhelm the passer, a turn of his wrist 
can convey this intelligence to the end. The 
end then knows that he has a bit of extra 
territory to guard. But it is only after a 
III 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

man has become a skilled football player 
that his eyes and mind will be able to concen- 
trate on the ball and yet see and analyze at 
once any signal that his team-mate may give 
him. If this seems particularly hard re- 
member that it simply represents a condition 
that applies to baseball as well. The signals 
of a shop team, or a semi-professional team, 
are often rudimentary and are very often 
missed. In the big leagues the slightest sig- 
nal,, though given at the tensest moment of 
the game, is invariably seen and responded 
to by every player affected. In all sports 
what becomes habit to the skilled player 
seems, to the novice, almost an unattainable 
art. 

On defense, the tackle supplements the end 
in this — that he tries to drive the play in to- 
ward the center of the line where it will meet 
concentrated weight and strength. But 
should the play succeed in getting outside the 
tackle, the situation is not as fateful as would 
be the case were the play to get outside the 
end. The runner who gets outside the tackle 
is still within easy range of the backfield men, 

112 



THE LINE 

whereas the runner who gets around the end 
very often skirts the edge of the backfield and 
has a clear run ahead. 

The tackle must be powerful, and that 
means that he must have power enough to 
carry his opponent back Into the play. He 
should also clean up interference and try to 
get the runner — all of which makes for a 
busy life. He must not, however, be drawn 
in. In that event he will find that he has been 
fooled; that the play is not at all what it was 
made to seem, and that he has left a hole 
in the line through which the runner can 
lunge. On ordinary plays he should shoot in 
a yard or two, carrying his opponent back 
if the opponent is in his way, fight clear with 
his hands and watch for the development of 
the play. The moment he sees it clearly he 
should go for it and try to split it apart, but 
he must not be drawn across to the other side 
of the center until he is sure, for they may 
fool him and turn the play on his side of the 
line. Above all he must keep on his feet; 
and should he go down while meeting a 
charge, he should try to use his feet and his 

"3 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

hand and his body to bring down as many 
of the interference as he can. An active, 
wriggling, fighting tackle in a moment like 
this is a joy forever. I have seen a tackle 
bumped from his feet, and, from the ground, 
contrive to tumble the whole play, including 
the man with the ball. But the tackle who 
stays on his feet is, in the larger elements of 
the game, the more certain man. It is the 
exceptional thing to find a fallen tackle still 
exerting an influence on the play. He goes 
down under kicks the same as the end, but if 
he is the right tackle with a right-footed 
kicker, he must first do his blocking. 

The left tackle can go down more freely. 
On forward passes by the opponents he must 
go in and hurry the thrower, giving him no 
time to get set or to wait for the receiver to 
get down the field. On kicks by the oppon- 
ents he goes in to block the kick, and his last 
jump should be in front of the kicker's foot, 
throwing his hands as high as possible I And 
oh, the joy when his far-flung hands slap a 
kick and drive it back to spell the ruin of 
the opposing team's chances. 
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THE LINE 

On offense the tackle's job is to protect 
the play, to open holes, to drive the dan- 
gerous man in or out, and in some cases to 
slip through and catch the secondary. We 
will suppose a play to be made off our own 
left tackle. Our right tackle works his op- 
ponent out a little so as to leave an opening, 
and then immediately when the ball 19 
snapped, he shoots diagonally across for the 
secondary on the far side. It is remarkable 
how easily he can get there and how, coming 
from that particular angle and unexpectedly, 
he may put the secondary back out of busi- 
ness. The same play is possible, only of 
somewhat different character, when a for- 
ward pass is made over that side of the line 
jand this right tackle takes a longer diagonal 
and acts as an interferer on the secondary; 
after the ball has been caught. In cases of 
this kind he must be careful not to run into 
any man until the pass is caught. 

In all these activities, just as when he is 

on defensive, he should remember that the 

more he keeps on his feet the better. For 

instance, if he can cut down the secondary 

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FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

and get the runner by, all without leaving his 
feet, he is still available as interferer farther 
down the field. 

The first caution to be given a guard on 
defense is not to knife through. Like the 
tackle he must not be drawn in, for some of 
the strongest plays to-day are those fakes on 
one side of the center that suddenly come 
shooting through the guard opening on the 
other side. The guard must charge hard 
from a crouching position, lifting his man up 
and driving him back. He must not leave 
his feet, he must not be smothered. He must 
not always charge the same way, but should 
now and then threaten to slip through and 
thus keep his opponent uneasy and unpre- 
pared. He must work not only with his 
center, but also with his tackle; and it is a 
mighty good thing, on occasion, for these 
three men to shift their ground a bit so as 
to upset the plans of the opposing team. 
Nothing is so disconcerting for a team as to 
determine to ram a man through tackle, and 
then to find that the opposing line has shifted 
so that the guard is playing where the tackle 
ii6 



THE LINE 

ought to be. When center, guard and tackle 
shift out they should always warn the other 
guard, for the movement leaves a gap that 
he must protect. 

The more a guard can drive a man into a 
play and still keep clear himself the better 
his chance to destroy the opponent's attack. 
But when I say he should charge and drive 
his man back, I do not mean that he must go 
charging halfway down the field. His charge 
goes about a yard, and then he sets with his 
hands and arms free until he sees exactly 
where the play is doing. 

On offensive the guard must remember 
that the first requisite is to get the play 
started. He should not be so eager that he 
opens up a hole and lets a man hurry the 
quarter. He has several kinds of blocking 
and charging to do on offense. On a push 
play he gets under and lifts his opponent, 
charging for two or three steps. Push plays 
are those used when the distance necessary to 
make a down is very short, and they are the 
only plays on which the guard must not keep 
his feet. On a kick he blocks long and tight, 
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FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

never trying to go down the field until he is 
sure that the kick is off. 

There are two kinds of defensive that 
a center can play. On one — the customary 
thing — he stays up in the line. On the other 
he drops back two or three yards and be- 
comes a roving center. The roving center 
job requires keen instinct to diagnose what is 
coming, and it should be resorted to only by 
a man who has, as it were, cut his football 
eye teeth. For the novice to try to play a 
roving center would be to spell disaster for 
his team. 

In the line on defense the center's play is 
similar to that of the guard. When he drops 
back and roves, his play then becomes almost 
akin to that of the middle secondary man 
about whom I will tell you in the next chapter. 
The roving center watches carefully, en- 
deavoring to anticipate the spot where the run 
is to be made, and shifts his ground accord- 
ingly. He varies the distance he plays back 
according to the anticipated play and accord- 
ing to the distance that must be gained, play- 
ing close to the line when he has every reason 
ii8 



THE LINE 

to expect a push play. He gets out, when 
necessary, for an end play or a play off 
tackle, and watches continually for short for- 
ward passes. 

On offense the center must think first of 
getting the ball back properly. He must 
not vary the speed of his passing. Most 
fumbles in the backfield are due to faulty 
passing by the center. He must not try to 
charge and pass at the same time. First he 
must get the ball back; but the moment he 
has passed it — except when he is blocking 
on a kick — ^he should make himself generally 
useful, and do it instantly. 

Every man in the line should be taught that 
there are two methods of opening holes for 
the runner. One is the quick, sharp opening 
that is characteristic of a plunging play; the 
other is the longer, cumulative charge that 
crowds the other line and tEeri opens late. 
The two methods are quite dissimilar, and 
the linemen must be taught individually. On 
a plunge a quick momentary tilting of a man 
in the right direction, either by butting him 
in or thrusting him back, will give the open- 
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FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

ing, because the runner Is coming hard and 
fast and will be through instantly. In the 
other form of hole opening the man with the 
ball is coming behind interference that has 
a swinging style. The opposing line must be 
forced back rapidly, but collectively, back 
and out of the way, so that when the inter- 
ference and the runner hit it, it is yielding 
and thus is in the best position to give ground. 
Before I close this chapter I want to say a 
word on tackling, because it is an art that 
every player should know. Tackling is, per- 
haps, the most important feature of the 
game. Very often a mis-tackle by an end 
results in a touchdown, or if not in a touch- 
down at least in a long run from which a 
touchdown is probable. There are three 
things necessary for successful tackling- — 
nerve, quickness and grip. Crouch down, 
and shoot in shoulder first at the runner's 
hips or below. If you stick your hands out 
first, as so many inexperienced players do, a 
runner who knows his job will strike down 
your hands and be on his way. Shoot the 
hands out just as the dive is made. Your 

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THE LINE 

shoulder should strike the runner just above 
the knees, and if the tackle is correctly made 
he will collapse on the same principle as a 
blade closed on a jackknife. Don't tackle 
short and don't try to reach with the hands. 
The farther the shoulder goes in, the greater 
reach the arms will have. The arms should 
close just around the bend of the knees. If 
you can practice tackling on a dummy you 
are indeed fortunate; but if you do have a 
dummy somebody must watch the tackling to 
see that it is done right. 

Tackling behind is not a question of skill 
but a question of speed. It means that you 
have to run the other man down. There is 
one cardinal principle here — don't try too 
soon. Make sure you are close enough ; then 
leap on your man and bear him down. The 
only time you take a chance when not sure of 
your distance is when to delay means that 
the runner will score. Then you take your 
fling at fortune. 



CHAPTER VII 

THE BACKFIELD 

The backfield of a football team must be 
viewed from two angles, and each angle is 
distinct and separate from the other. One 
angle views the backfield as a whole. It 
represents the backfield on attack and distin- 
guishes it from the line which represents, in 
an apt illustrative sense, the screen for this 
attack. The second angle views the backfield 
as a defensive body. Here it becomes at once 
a question of individuals. 

On attack the backfield man is one of a 
group. On defense he becomes an individual, 
with an individual share of territory to guard, 
a specific part of the line to bolster, and small 
chance of succor from any but one of his 
fellow backs should he misplay his share 

122 



THE BACKFIELD 

in the defense. There are very many foot- 
ball teams that go to ruin because they fail to 
realize these fundamentals of successful 
backfield play. 

Let us view the backfield on attack, work- 
ing harmoniously as a whole. The thrusts 
that are made at the opponents must always 
have one of two things, interference or de- 
ception. If, for instance, only one man is 
to go into the line at some point and is to 
make his charge unaided trusting to surprise 
to see him through, the probability of success 
will be largely increased if some man or men 
in the backfield make a blind attack at some 
other point in the line. These line attacks 
are dashes of quick, almost spontaneous, ac- 
tion. Whatever happens, be it gain or loss, 
happens quickly. These one man attacks are 
usually used when the distance needed is not 
great. Without the blind attack launched by 
the other backfield men, the man with the 
ball would be doomed to almost certain 
failure. Aided, though, by his companions 
behind the line, he has a fair chance to suc- 
ceed when the play is deftly coordinated and 
123 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

manipulated with snap and pep and the line 
gets the jump on the other line. 

On the other hand, If a backfield man Is 
to make a wide run, then he needs the bene- 
fit of the interference of his companions. A 
thrust at the line can be disguised because 
it happens so quickly, but a wide run is pos- 
sible of disguise for only a fraction of a 
second. The runner's destination is seen, 
the opponents move to meet the threat, and 
the need of interference becomes paramount. 

In all the offensive work of the backfield 
the line must cooperate. The linemen screen 
the play as long as they can. They resist all 
effort of the opposing forwards to come 
through. They force back the opposition 
and make openings. On offense the backfield 
and the line are securely linked. 

No captain, coach or strategist will get 
very far who fails to use all the elements of 
football. Building up a backfield alone will 
not suffice. Building up a line alone will not 
bring victory. Line and backfield must think 
and act in unison. They are the electric 
socket and the lamp. Separated, they are 

124 



THE BACKFIELD 

each inanimate and useless. Joined together 
they are a living flame of energy and action. 
Lack of cooperation here ruins effectiveness. 

On attack the chief business of the back- 
field is to advance the ball. In order to ad- 
vance successfully a backfield must be a co- 
ordination of speed, and it must be able to 
keep hidden the point of attack. 

Coordination of speed means, simply, 
that interferers do not outrun the man 
with the ball, that the man with the ball is 
not late, and that he does not crowd his in- 
terferers so closely that, should one of them 
be spilled, he runs sprawling into his falling 
aid arid goes down himself. And the line 
has its share, as I said previously, in coor- 
dination. It must open its holes so that they 
will be there when the man with the ball ar- 
rives. A hole opened too soon is usually 
closed when the runner arrives and might 
just as well not have been opened at all, for 
the energy that the opposing lineman has used 
to get into position again Is at its flood and 
ready to meet the attack with all Its zest. 
Moreover, too early an opening gives the de- 
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FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

fensive backs knowledge of just where to 
jump to meet the attack. Neither is a hole 
opened too late any great use, for then the 
runner has been slowed up by the unyielding 
wall he has found and is not in position to 
take advantage of the opening when it does 
come. 

In one of the earlier chapters I spoke on 
the practice of walking through plays in the 
early days of the practice. This is of the 
greatest value in teaching players that each 
man has his something to do and must do it 
on time. Occasionally, if plays go limping 
through lack of coordination, it is well to 
pause, walk through the play, have each man 
impressed with what he is to do and when 
he is to do it, and then quicken the play so 
that, within a few minutes, it is running 
again at its top speed. 

There are very many backfields that, 
though possessing men who can strike hard 
as individuals, yet drag dismally through 
lack of speed coordination. Far better is it 
to have men who strike feebly as individuals, 
but wfho surge forward with superb power as 
126 



THE BACKFIELD 

a group. For interferers to outrun the man 
with the ball is to spell the tragedy of wasted 
effort. They put men out of the play, but 
before the runner is at the spot some of the 
opponents have recovered and are ready for 
business. When the runner himself is late, 
the second chapter of the tragedy is played, 
for once again men put out of the play have 
staged a resurrection and are in a position 
to spoil what looked like a golden chance. 
Some years ago Rutgers used a powerful 
back who was a bit slow. In a game with 
Stevens the backfield slowed down its speed 
to fit this man whenever he ran with the 
ball. It was good coordination, and the 
gains were consistent. 

Coordination means practice, practice, 
practice. It is the sort of work that lacks 
inspiration and fire — it is mostly sweat. But 
the team that has its heart in the game will 
stick to it and make this angle of Its play 
as nearly perfect as can be. 

Coordination is not all a question of tim- 
ing. Many things have a part in it, but 
these are things that, through practice, should 
127 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

become mechanical — and they do become 
mechanical to a good team. 

Coordination, in its widest sense, means a 
complete backfield sense of faith, confidence 
and security. It cannot exist with a center 
whose passing to the quarter is not even and 
sure. It cannot exist where the quarter- 
back's passing to the runners is erratic. It 
cannot exist where the backfield men have a 
habit of fumbling. Let one backfield player 
develop a genius for fumbling the ball or for 
dropping it when tackled hard, and the effi- 
ciency of that backfield will be lessened by 
fifty per cent. Every time the unfortunate 
player gets the ball, unconsciously every other 
backfield player will be wondering if he will 
hold it. That thought, creeping into their 
minds, will weaken the sense of faith, con- 
fidence and security. Do you wonder that, 
even in the last days of a season, at the col- 
leges the 'Varsity men still go on with pass- 
ing and handling the ball? Never let a 
team get the idea that it does not need any 
more passing and handling. And teach every 
member of the backfield to hug the ball 
128 



THE BACKFIELD 

strongly when he runs with it and to clutch 
it desperately whenever he is tackled. Every 
big college can point sadly to games that 
were lost because somebody dropped the 
ball. 

Then there are other backfields that coor- 
dinate superbly, and yet fall down through 
failure to conquer the principles necessary to 
provide deception. Three out of every five 
backfields give away their plays to opponents 
who are keen of vision and who are crafty 
and polished with football experience. About 
one form of ''give-away" I told you in a pre- 
vious chapter. This happens when the 
backfield man lets his eyes roam in the direc- 
tion of the play, or else unconsciously shifts 
position a bit and points with his feet the 
better to get a start. Time after time meth- 
ods such as these have ''tipped off" keen foot- 
ball players and have spelled the failure of 
good plays. The backfield man must train 
himself to stand the same way every time so 
that his feet give no clue. And he must keep 
his eyes under absolute control. 

But there is another form even more 
129 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

prevalent. I have reference now to those 
interferers who, off on a blind or fake 
thrust, put so little life and drive into their 
effort that experienced football men know 
at once that their advance is only a feint. 

This is a fault that is generally acquired 
in practice. When a team is running through 
a signal drill, the men who are in the blind 
thrust usually start quickly and smartly, and 
then ease up after going a few feet. The 
action becomes a habit, and when the same 
play is called for in a real game, habit as- 
serts itself and a team suffers. 

There is only one way for backfield meit 
to charge, either in actual play or in prac- 
tice, either in an actual drive or a blind 
thrust — and that is with all their powen 
Then this becomes a habit, and reaps its re- 
ward. Men who go out on a blind thrust 
should go with as much force and determina- 
tion as they would use were the runner ac- 
tually behind them. This is the only way iii 
which opponents can be kept in a mental 
and physical state of turmoil. Not long ago 
I saw a game of baseball that illustrated this 
130 



THE BACKFIELD 

point. Two were out, there was a runner 
on first base, and the batter hit a fly that 
went straight toward the right fielder. The 
runner on first knew that the ball was prac- 
tically certain to be caught. Yet he ran 
around the bases as though everything de- 
pended on his exertion. The batter, on the 
other hand, seeing the right fielder set to 
catch the ball, loafed. The fielder made a 
miserable muff. The runner on first had 
worked up such a fine burst of speed that 
he scored. But the batter, trying to spurt 
when he saw the error, was cut down at sec- 
ond base. Had he worked with as much vim 
as his team-mate, he should have been safely 
on third. The batter and the runner, in this 
instance, might be likened to the interferers 
in a blind thrust. One man came through 
because he played as though the whole game 
depended then and there on him. The other 
failed for lack of force and determination. 

We now come to the backfield on defense. 
I have purposely said that here the work is 
individual because I wanted to drive home 
the point of individual responsibility. But 

131 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

as a matter of fact there is some defensive 
cooperation. However, compared to the 
coordination that exists in attack, the coop- 
eration on defense is loose and elastic. 

The backfield on defense plays more or 
less a set game unless experience shows that 
there is a certain definite play to watch or 
a certain player to smother, in which event 
the men shift to meet the danger. Ordi- 
narily the two halfbacks play out fairly wide, 
one of the other backfield men plays in the 
middle fairly close to the line, and the fourth 
man plays down for kicks and for such de- 
fensive work as is necessary when a runner 
breaks through and gets a start. This fourth 
man must be a deadly tackier and fast on 
his feet. Whenever a runner gets past the 
other backs, he alone stands between the 
runner and a touchdown. On defense he 
does not have so much work to do as the 
other backs, but when he is called upon the 
situation for his team is desperate. He must 
not falter. He must meet the runner and 
must get him. He must be the type of 
player who cannot be fooled by false turns. 
132 



THE BACKFIELD 

And should the runner elude him, he must 
be fleet enough of foot to run him down 
from behind. As I said in another chapter, 
when he tackles thus from behind, he must 
not make his try too soon, for if he takes his 
chance and falls short, that particular touch- 
down is as good as scored. There is one 
exception to this rule. When the man with 
the ball Is getting dangerously close to the 
goal line — say about the ten-yard line — the 
pursuing back is sometimes called upon to 
take a desperate chance and make his flying 
leap. But he does this only when he is sure 
that, in the short distance that remains, he 
has little or no chance to lessen the gap that 
separates him from his target. 

A football attack is the concentration of 
play. The defense can be well likened to 
the spreading out of a defensive net. The 
more space each individual man in the back- 
field on the defense can protect with safety, 
the greater are the chances that that team 
will avoid anything like a disastrous long run 
by an individual opponent. 

The first point in this defense is the con- 

133 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

sideration of the halfback's cooperation with 
the end and the tackle. The defensive work 
of halfback, tackle and end is an elastic ar- 
rangement, and one of the prettiest sights in 
football is to watch these three players when 
they blend every movement. For instance, 
when the tackle shoots in to break up the 
interference on a run outside of tackle, the 
end, moving with him, works into the op- 
posing territory and is ready to shoot at the 
runner should he come to the outside of the 
tackle. (If the runner is forced inside he 
runs into the guard-center combination with 
its weight and power.) The halfback, mean- 
while, is not idle. As soon as he sees that 
there is no danger of a forward pass he gives 
his watchfulness to two things — first to see 
if the runner breaks to the inside of the 
tackle, in which case he helps to get him, and 
secondly, to watch the end. If the end 
shoots in, the halfback immediately springs 
to the outside so that by no possibility may 
the runner, if he gets free, circle the end. 
Here, as you see, each man has moved in 
support of the other man, the tackle leading 

134 



THE BACKFIELD 

the defensive strategy, the end following the 
tackle's lead, and the halfback guarding both 
the tackle and the end. When three men 
have played these positions together a long 
time, they learn the movements of each man 
of the trio and they present a serious obstacle 
to any attacks on the outside tackle. 

Next, as individuals, the backfield men 
must take care of line plunges, forward 
passes, quick kicks and long kicks. There 
are two kinds of forward passes of the or- 
dinary straight throw that worry a team on 
defense — a short pass close over the line for 
which the middle backfield man is watching, 
and long ones down the field diagonally to- 
ward the ends. For these diagonal passes 
the halfbacks are responsible, helped out, of 
course, by the man in the far backfield. 
These long diagonal passes, when they come 
off, usually produce long gains. They spell 
the reason why the halfback must first make 
sure a forward pass is not coming before 
he moves up to aid the tackle and the end. 

On running line plunges the middle second- 
ary man has the most work. He is In a posi- 

135 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

tion to see the break in the line the moment 
the bulge comes. He must see it the second 
it begins to work so that he has time to get 
the runner either as he is coming through or 
immediately thereafter before the man with 
the ball has time to untangle himself and get 
going. 

In Chapter II, I have pretty well covered 
the work of the backfield men, but there is 
still a word to say about the quarterback. 
There are two different forms of quarter- 
back work, one in which the quarter is only a 
halfback and one in which he feeds the ball 
from the center to the other backfield men. 
When the center passes the ball directly to 
the man who is to run with it we have 
what is termed the "direct pass." It is 
being used more and more because it 
makes but one handling of the ball in 
passing instead of two and thus decreases 
the chances of fumbles, and also because it 
makes the quarterback more available for 
interference and for running with the balL 

But when the ball is passed through the 
quarterback he must be taught to take such 

136 



THE BACKFIELD 

a position behind the center as will hot give 
away the play or indicate on what side of the 
line it is coming. Some quarters reach far 
under the center to take the ball. Others 
stand in a more nearly erect position and 
receive the ball on a toss up from the center. 
Some quarters stand square to the line and 
others stand sideways. If a man adopts the 
sideways stand he must be able to pass the 
ball in any direction from that position with 
a quick turn, or else he will give away the 
direction of the play. 

When the team plays a direct passing game 
three of the four men in the backfield may be 
of the same general type, fast runners of 
medium weight, good on interference and 
sufficiently heavy to do a reasonable amount 
of the work. The fourth man or one of the 
four should be heavy enough to stand a con- 
sistent amount of line plunging, and should 
also be able to play middle secondary up 
moderately close to the line and to meet line 
plunges with a heavy charge. The details of 
all the work have already been described. 



CHAPTER VIII 

BUILDING PLAYS 



A FOOTBALL play IS like the construction 
of an edifice. It must have a simple, sound 
foundation; and the broader that foundation 
is and the more versed the men are in simple 
fundamentals . of play, the higher and 
stronger the construction that can be built 
upon that foundation. 

Complicated plays have their place in 
football, and it is a big place. But nine out 
of ten teams move on to complicated plays 
too soon. I do not mean by this that a team 
can afford to wait until late in the season 
before putting on their final plays. No play 
was ever effective, except by luck, that had 
not been fought out in many a hard scrim- 
138 



BUILDING PLAYS 

mage in order to find out Its weaknesses and 
especially in order to establish confidence in 
the play. 

But a complicated play put on too early, 
before the men are well grounded, is ruined 
almost from its inception. It takes on so 
many faults that there is no possibility of 
its being brought to perfection later. 

In order to show this, I will devote this 
chapter, in the main, to a diagram of plays. 
There is much about them that I could say 
that I will not say. The player who has read 
this book to this chapter and has digested 
what he has read will not need much ex- 
planation to see the points of play. If they 
are at first a little muddled to him, he will 
be the better off If he studies them out for 
himself. He will be learning to use his foot- 
ball brain. I will say this, though : the plays 
show original bases, first additions, the 
smoothing off, the necessary masking, and 
the final drive and power. The player will 
find, as he studies the original plays and then 
goes on to the others, that the additions 
could never be successfully made except by 

139 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

teams that had first learned the originals of 
these attacks. 

The original plays are, in the main, the 
variations of a simple running attack. From 
these plays every man on the team can be 
taught the following fundamentals : 

Snapping the ball properly and steadily. 

Quarterback Handling the ball cleanly and 
accurately. 

Backs learning how* to carry and to 
squeeze the ball. 

Blocking by the men of the line. 

Interference and putting out men by the 
backs. 

Forward passing by the backs. 

Receiving forward passes by ends and 
backs. 

Proper position of backfield men so as not 
to betray direction of play. 

Quick openings for line plunges. 

Kicking and covering kicks. 

Quick kick from running formation. 

Direct passing to any back. 

Diagrams from i to 8 represent the sim- 
ple plays. They should be studied thor- 
140 



BUILDING PLAYS 

oughly if the player hopes to master the later 
details* Diagram No. I shows the usual 

O O O X o o o 

o 



o 



o 



o 

Diagram I 
football formation, the quarter behind the 
center, the halfbacks out a little and the full- 
back playing deep. In Diagram No. II the 
left half makes a run off tackle — note that 



o o 




Diagram II 

his interferers strike on either side of him. 

Diagram No. Ill presents a wide end run by 

141 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 



the left half, and in this play the interferers 
keep to the inside. In the fourth diagram 




Diagram III 
the right half makes a quick line plunge off 
guard, and the fullback and the left half 



o o o 



>«\> \y 




o 



Diagram IV 
make the fake thrust off left tackle.* The 
success of this play depends to a large extent 
* Quarter makes fake pass to fullback. 

142 



BUILDING PLAYS 



on how sharply and earnestly the full and 
the left half make their thrust. If they drive 



O O O X 



h h\ 




Diagram V 
earnestly and convince the opponents that 
the play is aimed at the left side, the right 
half has a good chance to go through. 



o o 




Diagram VI 
The fifth diagram shows an end run by the 
fullback, and in this play the principal inter- 

143 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

ference stays inside. The same is true of 
Diagram No. VI, showing a quarterback run 
around the right end. In Diagram No. VII 
we have a quick kick from regular forma- 



o o o 



t? 




o o 



Diagram VII 




O O x/o O 



^O 



DiACRAU VIII— (Simple forward pass) 
144 



BUILDING PLAYS 

tlon by the fullback. He takes a step as he 
receives the ball, and kicks at once. Here 
is one of the plays that shows the importance 
of a kicker who can get the ball away accu- 
rately and speedily. A slow kicker would 
have very little chance in this play. The 
eighth diagram presents a forward pass, full- 
back to right end. In all these diagrams the 
solid line shows the course of runner or of 
interference; the dotted line represents the 
course of the ball. 

O O O X O O O 
O O 

O 
O 

Diagram IX 

Diagrams Nos. IX, X, and XI represent 
an addition to the attacking strategy of the 
team. Diagram No. IX shows what is known 
as the *'four-square" formation. Diagram 
No. X shows an unbalanced line, with the 

145 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

left tackle playing on the right of the center. 
No. XI is the usual *'shift" formation. 

O O X o o o o 

o o 

o 
o 

Diagram X 

These special formations add variety to the 
standard plays and help to keep the op- 
ponents confused and agitated. Yet, from 

O OxO O 

o o 
o o 

o 

Diagram XI 
146 




BUILDING PLAYS 

these three formations all the first seven 
plays can be run off. 

We now come to the shift plays, and if 
you will study these plans you will see how 
impossible it would be for a team to make a 
complicated play come through successfully 
without having had a thorough grounding in 
the first essentials. Diagram No. XI shows 
the first position of a shift. The tackles are 



O O X o o o 

o o 
o 
o 

Diagram XII 



bstck. At the first signal they jump Into the 
line, either In regular position or with both 
tackles on one side as In the unbalanced. 
From this all original plays can be run, but 
the success of the manoeuver depends on the 
smoothness with which the tackles do their 
work and the swiftness with which the play 
starts once they get into position. 

147 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

Diagram No. XII gives the formation of a 
shift play with one man in motion. This 



o O O X o o o 




Q. 

Diagram XIII 

play, when it runs hard and smooth, Is a 
terror to stop. The men line up as in the 
eleventh diagram, and at the word *'Hep!" 
the tackles spring up and form an unbal- 
anced line. As the tackles come up the right 
end goes out wide as is shown in the twelfth 
diagram. He is out wide when the signal 
is given. 

At the signal the end starts back a little 
and toward the play. Just as the ball is 
snapped and as the ball goes to the man who 

148 



BUILDING PLAYS 

is to carry it, the end swings into the line 
and forms one of the interference. All the 
original plays can be run from this forma- 
tion, too. Right here I might add that while 
most of the plays I have given here shoot 
at the right side of the line, they can be 
brought over to the left side by reversing 
the players. 



Diagram XIV 

The fourteenth diagram shows a double 
pass coupled with a forward pass. Quarter- 
back passes to the left half who in turn passes 
to the right half who is playing wide. The 
full runs over to the right half, first to give 
the impression that he will interfere for him 
149 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

on a surprise run and in reality to protect 
him and let him pass should an opponent 
come through. The moment the quarter 
passes the ball he goes through to interfere 
for the end who is to take the throw; a fine 
football play when it is well worked. 

At this stage we come to still more com- 
plicated plays and fakes. The fifteenth dia- 
gram shows another of these "one-man-in- 
motion" plays. The end goes out wide and 
starts running in. The ball comes to the 
quarter who holds it the fraction of a sec- 
ond. The full and the right half go hard 
as in a run off tackle. Then the quarterback 
slips the ball to the left half for a straight 
plunge. Take away from this play its wide 
playing end in motion and sec how closely it 
resembles Diagram No. IV. Basically, it is 
the same play. 

This play can go another way. The 
quarterback can let the left half go past him 
and drive at the line. Then he can run back 
wide to the right and forward pass to die 
right end. 

Studying and analyzing diagrams is one 
150 



BUILDING PLAYS 

of the surest ways to learn football. Make 
plays of your own. After they are made, 
use pieces of paper and blocks of wood to 
represent opposing elevens, and see what de- 




I 



Diagram XV 



fenses you can form against your own plays. 
Sometimes the play that you think faultless 
goes to pieces when you manipulate an op- 
posing eleven to meet it. 



151 



CHAPTER IX 

THE STRATEGY OF FOOTBALL 

Let us consider the strategy of the game 
aside from the character of the plays them- 
selves. First comes the use of the wind. In 
all kicking it is essential to consider the wind 
carefully. 

If your side is kicking with the wind, al- 
ways remember to work the ball over to the 
windward side of the field so as to get a 
longer diagonal kick down into the opposing 
territory. If you are kicking against the 
wind, however, and it comes from one side 
of the field more than another, work up so 
as to avoid it as much as possible or to gain 
a little from it. 

The average boys' team always waits until 
the fourth down before kicking. As a gen- 

IS2 



THE STRATEGY OF FOOTBALL 

eral rule, this is a mighty poor policy, 
whether the kick be a punt or a drop. For 
one thing, when the kicker goes back on 
fourth down, the opposition knows that it is 
almost sure to be a kick and not a bluff. This 
nourishes their confidence and enables them 
to come through without hesitation and to 
hurry the kick or block it. On the other 
hand, if a team takes the kicking formation 
on second or third down, the opposition does 
not know whether it is a kick or a run. Con- 
sequently they will be slow to take liberties 
for fear of being drawn in. 

Quarterbacks should watch carefully the 
condition of the field and take any possible 
advantage of any conditions that may pre- 
vail. On a sloppy field, a quarterback will 
keep his eyes open for a dry spot, and when 
he finds it he will use it for staging a run. 
On a field that slopes downhill toward a 
side line, a wise quarter, needing a certain 
distance, may elect to try this downhill run 
rather than to buck away up toward the 
middle. 

The general, principle of kicking when in 

153 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

your own territory, and not trying to run 
with the ball until in the opponent's territory, 
is always sound football. It is not necessary, 
however, to kick on first down even in your 
own part of the field. When playing against 
the wind, it is necessary to do some running 
even in your own territory. This does not 
mean to run with the ball to the fourth down. 
The idea of running is to gain some of the 
distance that will be lost when the opponents 
kick, because, having the wind with them, 
their punts will be the longer. Simply to kick 
against them would be to slowly but surely 
lose ground and eventually be scored on. 
The idea of running at this stage is simply to 
overcome the advantage that the wind gives 
to the other side. 

Forward passes, unless the situation is 
desperate, are too dangerous to use inside 
your own thirty-yard line. As a rule, on sec- 
ond or third down is the best time to use a; 
forward pass; and second or third down is 
also the best time to use a play which, though 
it may not be certain, has great possibilities 
for a long gain. On later downs, when only 
154 



THE STRATEGY OF FOOTBALL 

a short distance is needed, the plays to use 
are the ones that will not gain much, but 
which are sure not to lose distance. 

Almost every boys' team will have one or 
more plays that are sure ground gainers. 
Likewise, there will be plays that never seem 
to achieve anything. These latter plays 
should be dropped. In fact, as the season 
runs along, it will be found that plays of 
which much was expected have failed to 
make good. It is folly to waste time on 
these. If a play cannot be made to produce 
gains, something is wrong with it, and it 
should be discarded. On the other hand, the 
plays that are sure gainers should be kept 
in mind. And, of course, between the two 
there will be plays that sometimes gain and 
sometimes lose and sometimes just hold their 
own. 

There should be no guesswork about the 
plays that are good and the plays that are 
not. If necessary, have somebody who 
knows the plays follow the ball up and down 
the field. This person can make note of 
every play, how much it gains or how much 

155 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

It loses. By the time such a record has been 
made through two or three games, the team 
win know just which plays it is best to drop. 
No team can hope to play a consistent game 
of football unless it has some such knowl- 
edge at its finger tips. Without this knowl- 
edge it will be wasting its strength, and 
should it come within scoring distance of the 
opponents' goal line, it will not know which 
plays it can reasonably count on to put the 
ball across. It will have to guess. 

A team that expects to try a drop kick at 
goal should always work toward the middle 
of the field on the down before it expects 
to try the drop. On the other hand, when a 
team punts out from its own goal, it should 
put the ball as near the side line as possible 
to prevent the opponents getting a fair catch 
and an easy try at goal. 

Of course, there is nothing to prevent a 
team doing the unexpected and the unusual. 
Sometimes it is wise to try the unexpected in 
the hope that the opponents will be caught 
napping. As a rule, however, field tactics 
demand that a certain type of football be 

156 



THE STRATEGY OF FOOTBALL 

played in certain parts of the field. While 
these rules are not mandatory, and while 
teams have broken them and won, they 
nevertheless represent what experience has 
taught should be the conduct of an attacking 
team under ordinary, average circumstances. 
Teams that are coached are taught not 
only to play the game, but how to play it. 
For this reason the football field is di- 
vided into zones. A well-trained team knows 
what is ordinarily expected of it the moment 
it gets the ball, basing this knowledge prin- 
cipally on the part of the field in which it 
receives the ball. Other things to be con- 
sidered are the score, the length of time left 
to play, and the condition of the opposing 
team. But so far as a boys' team is con- 
cerned, it IS best for it to concern itself 
merely with the established field tactics. 
[ To understand what these tactics are, it 
IS necessary to have a field diagram, and one 
IS given in Chapter VIII, page 141. You 
will notice that the field is divided into six- 
teen zones, and each of these zones calls 
for a particular type of play. 

157 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

Section A — ^Here a team is in vital dan- 
ger. It is in the shadow of its own goal 
posts. A fumble now would easily spell 
disaster, and there is little use in prolonged 
rushing because of the long distance that 
would have to be gained before a team 
would reap much benefit from its exertions. 
The wise thing is to get the ball out of dan- 
ger as quickly as possible. It is best to kick 
on first or second down unless playing 
against a very strong wind where every yard 
would count. In no event, however, should 
a team in this section hold the ball until 
fourth down before kicking. 

Section BB — Here it is often best to 
waste a down by running the ball out of 
bounds. When it is brought out the kicker 
is in a position to get off a safer kick. 

Section C — Here, before kicking, it is 
worth while to try a run from kick forma- 
tion; either that or some other play that 
offers an opportunity of getting in a chance 
long run. "Some other play,'* though, does 
not mean a forward pass. A forward pass 
in this zone is too uncertain and dangerous. 

158 



THE STRATEGY OF FOOTBALL 

The team that has one forward pass that 
is generally successful might try to work it 
ifl the situation were desperate — as, for in- 
stance, but a few minutes to play and a touch- 
down needed to win. Only a desperate situa- 
tion, though, would offer any excuse for try- 
ing an aerial play. 

Section DD — ^Here again it is usually well 
to run the ball out of bounds. A kick should 
be made on the second or third down. The 
team is still too close to its own goal to do 
much more than get the ball out of danger. 

Section E — Now comes the place for criss- 
crosses and concealed ball plays. This zone 
is far enough from the goal to be reasonably 
safe even on a fumble, and a long run here 
will put a team within scoring distance. 

Section FF — ^Here it is possible to wait 
and use running plays until the third down. 
It is not necessary to waste a down by carry- 
ing the ball out of bounds, for it Is not as 
vital that the kicker have every extra inch as 
it is in Sections BB and DD. 

Section G — ^This is the ideal position for 
a long forward pass on second or third down. 
159 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

If the ball is lost, the team has plenty of 
room in which to put up a defense. If the 
pass comes off and an end secures it well 
down the field, it is very apt to result in a 
touchdown. 

Section HH — ^Here, also, a forward pass 
may be used on second or third down. It is 
also a good place to use a series play — that 
is, three or four plays on one signal, winding 
up with a long end run. A series play, to be 
effective, must be run off rapidly. The team 
that takes its time about lining up after a 
down gives the opponents plenty of oppor- 
tunity to prepare. 

Section I — ^The team now enters its op- 
ponents' territory, and the character of its 
play changes. From now on the running 
game is called for. In this zone, any play 
that is extremely deceptive and likely to get 
a man loose for a clear run is worth trying 
on a first or second down. 

Section JJ — Here again are good oppor- 
tunities for a long forward pass down the 
side line on third down. It is just as well 
to wait until third down here as a running 
i6q 



THE STRATEGY OF FOOTBALL 

play may give a good start toward a score. 

Section K — This is a most desirable sec- 
tion for placement kicks for goal, but first 
the running game should be used. It would 
be folly to accept a field goal when a running 
attack might net a touchdown. 

Section LL — Here it is advisable to wait 
until the third down before kicking. 

Section M — Anywhere inside the thirty- 
yard line is a good position for an accurate 
drop kicker. It is preferable that he kick on 
third down, because then he will not be 
hurried as the opponents will not dare to 
break through too freely. It is often well 
in this section to use a forward pass on sec- 
ond down if a running play on first down 
has failed. But if the team is gaining ground 
steadily on its running plays, do not risk the 
forward pass. 

Section NN — ^Here, after using a running 
play without success, it is well either to try 
a forward pass or else run the ball out to- 
ward the center of the field if the team has 
a good drop kicker. 

Section O — Here is the place for the 
i6i 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

strongest scoring plays. That is why a team 
should keep track of its plays and know what 
its scoring plays are. The team must get over 
the line, and it must use its best men and its 
best plays to get over. Another reason why 
the best is called for is the fact that the de- 
fensive team always fights harder within its 
own ten-yard line than on any other part of 
the field. It is the old saying of the man 
with his back against the wall. 

Section PP — Here, too, the strongest run- 
ning plays are needed. However, it is well 
on third down, if the defense is holding tight, 
to run the ball out toward the center of the 
field. Then, should it look as though neither 
a touchdown nor a first down can be made 
on the fourth try, a drop kick can be tried 
if the team has an accurate kicker. If it has 
no accurate kicker, it is best to stick to the 
running plays. 

After all, football is much like everything 
else. Persistence accomplishes wonders. The 
team that faithfully practices the funda- 
mentals, knows the signals, sticks to the work 
day in and day out, studies strategy and tac- 
162 



THE STRATEGY OF FOOTBALL 

tics, and tries to use its brains, will go farther 
than the most brilliant team that loafs and 
shirks and does not keep its knowledge pol- 
ished. 

Play the game hard, play the game square 
— and good luck to you ! 



CHAPTER X 

THINGS THAT MAKE OR BREAK A TEAM 

The spirit of a team is something that 
has a lot to do with its success or failure. 
Only a coach of long experience realizes 
what a factor **spirit" represents once a 
team takes the field. Plays can be mapped 
out on a blackboard, but spirit defies such 
treatment It is something within the men 
themselves, something that moves a team to 
stand on its one-yard line on first down and 
gloriously throw back every attempt of the 
opponents to score; a something that leads 
it to fight with staunch and glowing courage 
against odds that seem overwhelming; a 
vivid something that brings it through de- 
spite a hundred freaks and twists of out- 
rageous fortune, triumphant at the end. The 
164 



THINGS THAT MAKE OR BREAK A TEAM 

team that has spirit can never be called 
beaten, however one-sided the score against 
it, until the final whistle blows; the team 
without spirit seldom wins even when all the 
elements are in its favor. 

Football history bristles with hundreds of 
stories of teams that undoubtedly were su- 
perior to their opponents in all the technical 
points of play. Yet, when actual playing tests 
came, these teams usually were defeated. 
In the language of sporting writers the de- 
feat of a team technically superior to another 
team, is called "an upset of the dope." 
Usually, following such defeat, there are 
many arguments as to how the miracle hap- 
pened. Usually, too, there are a thousand 
or so explanations of the upset. It is com- 
mon enough for the disgruntled followers of 
the losers to take the viewpoint that the luck 
of the game, the ''breaks" as they are called, 
operated against the vanquished. But ex- 
planations, as a rule, fail to hit the real mark. 
The game goes down into history with the 
''upset of the dope" unexplained. 

Nine times out of ten, when a technically 

165 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

inferior team wins, it soars to victory be- 
cause it had a spirit that the other team 
lacked. 

We have, in almost a parallel sense, the 
same situation in war. History is alive with 
battles that favored one side in the things 
that spell the machinery of war— numbers of 
combatants, disposition of troops, superior- 
ity in guns and equipment. And yet a sudden 
stampede set in, the line was broken, retreat 
followed and the side so singularly favored 
found the battle lost. Why? 

The victors had the better morale. In 
football we call it **team spirit.*' 

If any man knew an absolutely certain sys- 
tem by which spirit could be instilled into a 
team, he might reap a small fortune by sell- 
ing his secret to college, school and industrial 
teams. But in spite of the mystery that sur- 
rounds this empirical element in football, 
there are certain things that we know help 
to bring it about. 

Harmony is, perhaps, the greatest builder 
of team spirit. No better description of it 
has ever been written than Dumas' famous 
i66 



THINGS THAT MAKE OR BREAK A TEAM 

*'A11 for one and one for all" of the *Three 
Musketeers." Harmony springs from the 
thrill of a common ideal and brings in its 
wake a combined, deep-seated resolution to 
give the last ounce of strength to bring vic- 
tory. When you see a battered eleven play- 
ing a dogged uphill game, and when you see 
the players of that eleven weeping as they 
leave the game, spent, mark this — there, on 
those tramped gridiron lines, crouches a team 
infused with the spirit of harmony. 

When there is harmony in a team, every 
man, regular and substitute alike, works 
for the common cause. There are no rival- 
ries and jealousies. There is no thought 
that the captain or the coach is playing 
favorites. When plays go wrong, the men 
sit down to talk them over and take and give 
censure with a deep conviction that nothing 
that is said is personal but that all criticism 
and suggestion come from a desire to serve 
the team. 

And there is faith, too — confidence in the 
formations that have been adopted and no 
lingering doubts about the plays. This is of 
167 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

supreme importance. No eleven can put a 
play through if four or five of the men have 
no faith in it. No team can have harmony 
when individual members doubt the strategy 
that has been decided on. 

The worst thing that can happen to a team 
is to have its members break up into little 
cliques, each with its own leader. The foot- 
ball player who attempts to organize or to 
lead a clique is nothing more or less than a 
trouble-maker. He is a traitor, not only to 
his team, but to every other man who is play- 
ing the game with a whole heart. Usually 
cliques are founded on jealousy. Some man, 
envious of the captain, perhaps, starts to 
stab him in the back — and stabs the team as 
well. The moment a man begins to organize 
a clique he should be dropped from the team 
regardless of how good a player he may be. 
A poorer player, who will give his whole 
strength to the work, is to be preferred to 
the star whose miserable, crabbed sense of 
loyalty leads him to sow the seeds of dis- 
cord. 

The leadership of the captain has much 
i68 



THINGS THAT MAKE OR BREAK A TEAM 

to do with the harmony of the team — that is 
why, as I told you early, too much care can- 
not be given to wise selection. No captain 
can bring harmony to a team if he is by 
nature arrogant and overbearing. Neither 
can he succeed if he is easy-going and lax and 
afraid to hurt feelings. There are times 
when sharp things must be said, and the right 
kind of captain can say them and not leave 
a scar or a wound. A captain must be firm, 
but just; a good fellow, but not a weakling; 
a diplomat, but no trafficker in small deceits. 
He must have the ability to pull his men to- 
gether, to bind them to him, to infuse them 
with enthusiasm for the team itself. And 
these things he will be able to do if the men 
know him to be absolutely square with them, 
with himself and with the team. 

Football is full of instances of captains 
who have voluntarily replaced themselves 
with substitutes because they thought the sub- 
stitutes the better men, and this at the start 
of the game. When this spirit prevails, de- 
feat can discourage a team momentarily but 
cannot dishearten it. Such leadership Is an 
169 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

inspiration, and the team that has it is indeed 
fortunate. But a captain should beware lest 
a little element of the theatrical creep into 
his mood and lead him to sacrifice himself 
when it is not absolutely necessary. A team 
expects the leadership of its captain, and he 
should lead when he can. When the time 
comes that he is sure that his team is 
stronger with him on the sideline than it is 
with him in the game, then there is only one 
place for him. The best traditions of team 
spirit demand it. 

Physical condition is another thing that 
makes or breaks a team. There is an in- 
visible line in conditioning. On this side of 
it a man is fit — on the other side, even the 
least bit on the other side, he is stale and is 
not only weakened physically, but nervously 
and mentally as well. It is often a difficult 
task to judge when a team is edging toward 
staleness, and sometimes an experienced 
coach will not know until too late that the 
damage has been done. Staleness should 
evidence itself in the practice. The men will 
be sluggish, the pep and fire will be gone, 
170 



THINGS THAT MAKE OR BREAK A TEAM 

they will tire easily, there will be an inclina- 
tion to flare up and get "scrappy/' or there 
will be a listlessness that nothing can arouse. 
At the colleges, where football men are under 
observation, it is always suspicious when a 
man begins to sleep badly, to worry and to 
**get off his feed." But with school and shop 
and neighborhood teams these things can be 
noted only by the man himself. If he finds 
himself in this predicament, the wise thing, 
the only loyal thing to the team, is to report 
to the captain his unfitness and then rest for 
a few days. When a whole team shows these 
signs, the wise course is to let the whole 
team rest even though the letdown come 
right on the eve of a game. Better a team 
that goes to Its big game minus some of the 
practice it might have had than a team that 
goes to battle dispirited and listless from the 
practice it should not have had. 

A team on edge will recover from an unex- 
pected reverse, take the bit in its teeth and 
fight desperately to retrieve its prestige. But 
a team gone stale, having lost its physical, 
mental and nervous force, will be thrown 
171 



FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

into a pessimistic attitude by an unexpected 
score recorded against it. The men will lose 
confidence in themselves and in their plays. 
They will have no resistive force with which 
to combat this depression. As a result they 
will go from bad to worse, from defeat to 
disgrace. Be careful above all things that 
your team does not go stale. Better not close 
enough to the line of condition on this side 
than a degree too far on the other side. But 
do not let fear of staleness lead to soft hand- 
ling of a team. Conditioning is a question 
that must be met practically. 

I have told you that a team must have 
absolute faith in the squareness of captain 
and coach. It must also have implicit faith in 
the judgment of these men. If there is ever a 
time when this implicit faith must be felt by a 
man, It must be when he finds himself ordered 
out and a substitute ordered in. He may feel 
that he is doing well, and is still strong and 
able — but the higher judgment is to take him 
out, and he must bow to it and accept it as 
sound judgment. There are many factors 
that go to affect a man's playing. He may 
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THINGS THAT MAKE OR BREAK A TEAM 

be dead sure on punts that come with the 
wind, but weak and uncertain on punts that 
come against the breeze, particularly a breeze 
that travels diagonally across the field. He 
may be a terror on a dry field, and yet not 
be thoroughly on his footing on a wet field. 
He may be sure and certain with a dry ball, 
but given to fumbles when the ball is wet and 
slippery. The individual player, wrapped 
up in the give and take of the game, is apt 
to lose sight of these factors. If he is play- 
ing in the line he may just be holding his 
man; but the man supporting him in the back- 
field may become alarmed at seeing him slip- 
ping and sliding and thus be put at a tension 
that is not at all observable to the wobbly 
man in the line. The player is simply a pawn 
in the game and his ambition should be to 
count most for his side. If he is taken out 
he must train himself not to question the de- 
cision. He sees only his own little sector of 
play; the man who ordered him out sees the 
whole field and the team as a whole. And 
here arises a more delicate situation for a 
coach, or for captains of teams which have 

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FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

no coach. It is that of the moment at which 
to replace a man. It may mean the winning 
or losing of the game. When to send in your 
drop kicker if perchance he is otherwise in- 
effective. You must be governed by the time 
elapsed in the period or by the score. If a 
drop will win or tie for you, you can take a 
chance which might be unwise if you were 
leading. But more delicate is the substitut- 
ing when pressed into your goal line. Never 
send a flighty player in here even though he 
be aggressive. Many a game has been lost 
by this mistake. The sound general prin- 
ciple is to let well enough alone when leading 
but to take chances when behind. The time 
to send in a fast speedy man is toward the 
latter part of a period when his opponents 
are tired, hence slow. The time to send in a 
strong, powerful, though somewhat slower, 
lineman is when a short distance is needed to 
go over or when you need extra power to pre- 
vent this very thing. 

Many games are won and lost during the 
intermission between the halves. Fiction 
abounds in stories in which the coaches, dur- 
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THINGS THAT MAKE OR BREAK A TEAM 

ing that rest period, have lashed a beaten 
team and have filled it with the zeal to go 
out and win. As a matter of fact, it rarely 
happens that way. A team that is behind is 
always more or less depressed. Instead of 
being scorched and burned, it must be given 
optimism and filled with a spirit of confidence 
before it goes out for the second half. It 
is the team that is ahead that is usually 
lashed. With such a team the idea is to stop 
any feeling of over-confidence or to combat 
any tendency to play safe. The team is told 
that the score should be larger, that it has 
not been taking advantage of its advantages, 
that it is the luckiest team alive that it is 
ahead. And instead of going out chipper 
and cocky that team goes out for the second 
half with its blood up to do better. 

One bad thing for a team is to have play- 
ers who have acquired the substitute habit. 
They become convinced that they will not be 
first-string men, and then two things happen : 
The team loses its chance to bring them up to 
first quality and they themselves never give 
the team the same first-class practice fight- 

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FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

ing that is given it by men who are struggling 
tooth and nail for the coveted places. 

No man ever Becomes a really good 
player on a first-class team if he does not 
begin at the bottom — on the scrub, or the 
second or third team, or even a substitute 
for the third or fourth team if the squad is 
that large. The man who thus fights his 
way up has far better possibilities in him than 
the man who is taken on reputation and who 
has not had this hard, gruelling work. It is 
by working up through the hard knocks of 
the scrub that a player acquires the all- 
around confidence and experience that will 
bring him through any emergency. 

The best punters in the college ranks have 
been the men who served as substitutes on 
scrub teams whose lines gave them very little 
protection. These men got used to having 
opponents come through at them rapidly and 
hard. They had to get their kicks off 
quickly and they learned how to take care 
of themselves. I have seen hundreds of good 
men develop from the scrub, men who would 
never have developed had they become dis- 

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THINGS THAT MAKE OR BREAK A TEAM 

couraged in the middle of the season and 
abandoned the game. When opportunity 
came these men were, by reason of their 
training, qualified to seize it. They had the 
great courage that goes with the successful 
football player. 

No player should get discouraged merely 
because he has seen a season or so of scrub 
work. Many a man develops late, drifts 
along as a substitute for a year or two, and 
then suddenly comes out as a product of all 
his hard work- — a first-class player. In- 
stances of this kind are far from rare; they 
go to prove that there are thousands of boys 
and young men who, if they persisted, would 
make excellent players. The great point is 
not to be satisfied with being a substitute, 
but to try harder and harder to make the 
team. 

Football is peculiar in this respect: hard 
work tells for more in it than in almost any 
other game. By hard work I do not mean 
brainless running about. I mean hard work 
coupled with hard thinking — studying others 
and trying to find new ways. In fact, one of 

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FOOTBALL WITHOUT A COACH 

the best things a substitute can do when he 
IS on the sideline is to study the play of the 
man in the position he is ambitious to occupy. 
Watch how the opponents handle him and 
how he handles himself. One of our greatest 
guards in the country told me he learned 
more football when I made him follow the 
team around at a time when he had a bad 
shoulder than he ever learned in all the rest 
of his play. 

A captain can keep his men interested if 
he tells them these facts. Another good 
point is to ask them from time to time, when 
they are on the sideline, what they see in par- 
ticular plays. When a man gets to thinking 
football he generally learns to play it better. 
The same kind of spirit that makes a man 
give up simply because by midseason he has 
not advanced beyond the scrub or is a sub- 
stitute IS the very kind of spirit that is not 
wanted on the football field. If that man 
does go in and his team is actually behind 
in the middle of the game, his quitting spirit 
will bring forth discouragement and he will 
not fight to overcome the lead. 

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THINGS THAT MAKE OR BREAK A TEAM 

Many a team that would otherwise fare 
well, loses many of its games by continuing 
to use plays which, though basically sound, 
yet do not come off because they are beyond 
the capabilities of the team. A play that 
becomes so shaky that the team is never sure 
of it, or that creates a grave danger that the 
ball will be lost, must be dropped. Attack- 
ing plays are supposed to advance the ball, 
not to lose ground. A team that is playing 
winning football can suddenly lose all its vim 
if a poorly executed play results in a fumble, 
a pick-up by an opponent, and a run through 
a broken field for a touchdown. 

Play football with your head and your 
heart as well as with your muscles. Play it 
hard, but play it square. Learn the rules. 
Keep in condition. Squeeze the ball, hit the 
line with all your power, and don^t foul. 

That is the best advice that one football 
man, grown gray in the game, can give the 
player coming into it with all the fresh vigor 
and enthusiasm of youth. 

(1) 

THE END 

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